[;,^zs><mc> m/Ti^<. 








WpaTED STATF' 

■IfBRAClHO A SRISP * 

HISTORY- OF THE PRINCIPAL EVENTS 

or THBIR 

INISTRAf fONS, 
TO wrora IS APpXNoxo. 

THE DECtARATIOS OF INDEPENDENCE, THE CONSTITDTION 

OF THE UNITED STATES, WASHINGTON'S FAREWELL 

ADDRESS, A LIST OF CABINET OFFICERS, AND A 

fABLE OF THE YEARLY EXPENDITURES 

OF THE GENERAL GOVERNMENT. 

BY BENSON J. LOSSING. ' .> 





iir-K ^ 




THE 



LIVES OF THE PRESIDENTS 



OF THE 



UNITED STATES; 



XMBRACINQ A BRIKF HISTCRT OT THX 



PRINCIPAL EVENTS OF THEIR RESPECTIVE ADMINISTRATIONS. 

TO WHICH IS APPENDED, 

thk diclaration of independence, the constitution of the united stites, 

Washington's farewell address, a list of cabinet officers, and a 

tablx of the tearlt expenditures of the general government 



BY BENSON J. LOSSIN^J. 




Capitol at Wuhingtoa. 

ILLUSTRATED WITH PORTRAITS AND INTERESTING LOCALITIES 



NEW YORK: 
PUBLISHED BY PHELPS & FANNING, 

189 BROAD WAT. 

186L 



1 



.1 

•I 81 



Entered, Meording to Act of Congress, in the year 1847, 
By HUMPHREY PHELPS & CO., 

la the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the United States, in end for Iha 
Southern District of New York. 



:::■:,■":'•" y 



PREFACE. 



We have prepared the following pages with the single purpose of presenting 
in a popular form, for the instruction of youthful Americans, the leading events 
in the respective lives and administrations of those who have been called to 
preside over the affairs of our republic. This is the first of a series of works, 
adapted to the tastes and wants of the young American, which we intend to 
prepare for the press, imder the earnest impression that in this way germs of 
knowledge, particularly useful to the American citizen, may be from time to 
time implanted in the luxuriant soil of the popular mind, that will, in the fu- 
ture, spring up and bring forth fruit a thousand-fold. 

Princes, especially those who are heirs-apparent to the throne of royalty, are 
instructed with the utmost care in all lessons of wisdom, and in the duties per- 
taining to the conduct of a reigning sovereign. Here, every boy is heir-appa- 
rent to the throne of sovereignty, and every girl may become a queen-mother. 
Hence it follows that general instruction upon subjects of national importance — 
those which relate to our history, jurisprudence, the characters of men active in 
our public affairs past and present, and all other topics with which an Ameri- 
can statesman and enlightened citizen ought to be familiar -— can not be too 
early instilled into the mind of the young of both sexes. The limits to which 
we shall restrict ourselves will preclude the possibility of treating any of these 
subjects in minute detail ; but we shall endeavor so to condense the principal 
points of interest, that no important omission will be found. If we shall thus 
succeed in depositing merely the germs of general information in the young 
mind, that, like nursery-tales, shall take deep root and never be forgotten ; or 
if we shall be instrumental in developing a thirst for knowledge, and awaken- 
ing earnest inquiries and investigation respecting the things we present to view, 
our object will be more than half accomplished, and we shall gladly perform 
the duty of usher at the portals of popular intelligence, pointing like a guide- 
post to the spacious galleries within : for we had rather be a door-keeper in the 
house of wisdom tnan to dwell in the tents of ignorance. 

In sketching the lives of the presidents, and the events of their respective 
administrations, we have been obliged to study and practise brevity ; but we 



IL- 



"* 



IV 



PREFACE. — CONTENTS. 



believe we have embraced all of the most important events connected with 
their career. We have devoted much more space to the first three than to any 
of the others for the obvious reason that, during the twenty years intervening 
between the inauguration of Washington and the retirement of Jefferson, the 
disjointed materials of a new government were adjusted and fixed, and the gen- 
eral policy of the country was established upon a basis still recognised as the 
true and just one. 

We have appended the Declaration or Independence, the Constitution of the 
United States, and Washington's Farewell Address, being documents that prop- 
erly belong in this connexion : for the first declared us free ; the second is the 
chart by which the ship of state is guided ; and the third is a lesson of sound 
practical wisdom for those who hold the helm. An addendum of much inter- 
est is also given, which shows the various phases of the executive branch of 
tne government, and the fiscal affairs of the country, at all periods since the 
formation of our federal compact. With this general notice of our object an<i 
design, we cast our crumb upon the waters. 



B. J. L 



New Yobk, September, 1847. 



CONTENTS. 

rAGK 

George Washington, first President of the United States 7 

John Adams, second President of the United States 29 

Thomas Jefferson, third President of the United States 39 

James Madison, fourth President of the United States 51 

James Monroe, fifUi President of the United States > 69 

John Quincy Adams, sixth President of the United States 65 

Andrew Jackson, seventh President of the United States 71 

Martin "Van Buren, eighth President of the United States 79 

William Henry Harrison, ninth President of the United States 85 

John Tyler, tenth President of the United States 89 

James Knox Polk, eleventh President of the United States 95 

Zachart Tatlor, twelfth President of the United States 99 

Declaration of Independence » 103 

Constitution of the United States 107 

Washington's Farewell Address 118 



LIYES OF THE PRESIDENTS. 




GEORGE WASHINGTON, 

THE FIRST PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES. 

T has too frequently been the self-imposed task of the bi- 
ographer, when delineating the lines of character which 
distinguished the great men whose lives he may have been 
portraying, to delve assiduously amid the debris of genea- 
logical records of the past to find some brilliant jewel of 
ancestry whence his subject might derive a superior lustre, 
and present a readier passport to the public regard. Great, sometimes, 
has been the anxious search for proofs of ancestral rank — rank derived 
merely from the bauble patent of nobility, bestowed according to the 
caprices of a prince ; and when that rank has been discovered, albeit 
the clue may have been covered up and hidden by plebeian or vicious 
obscurities, it has been gloried over as the basis of all the wealth of 
character to be rehearsed, and as the true signet of legitimate greatness, 
regardless of the paramount claims of virtue and intelligence. 

The field of biography is crowded densely with flowering shnibs of this 
nature, at whose roots lies the nutritious compost of mouldering nobili- 
ty, and they are thereby nurtured into a display of gi*een leaf and broad, 
bright flower, as expansive as the flaunting heliotrope ; while many a 
violet, of true divinity of character, is almost unheeded in its seclusion, 
and seen only by those who seek for real worth and loveliness amid the 
lowly in the world's esteem, and spiritually beautiful. 

But there are a few vigorous plants that tower high above all the 
rest, beautiful to the eye and fi-agrant beyond e8timation,''that, like those 
of the garden which derive their chief nutriment from the ammonia of 
the atmosphere, flourish by inherent energy and the genial influence 
of surrounding circumstances. There are gems of purest ray, that ra- 
diate, not reflect, a steady lustre ; there are characters that, instead of 



8 LIVES OF THE PRESIDENTS. 

His ancestors. — His military genius early developed. 

deriving illumination from even a truly noble ancestry, cast a brilliant 
retrospective light upon the genealogical tree, and, like the opal, " shine 
in lustre all their own/' Such was George Washington, to the bright- 
ness of whose character even joyalty itself could not add a ray. 

The family of Washington may be traced some distance back among 
the old English gentry at Turtfield and Wliarton, in Lancashire. There 
was a manor of that name in the county of Durham ; and about the 
middle of the thirteenth century, the proprietor, William de Hertbum, 
assumed the name of his estate, and from him the Washington family 
have descended. In the year 1657, John and Lawrence Washington, 
brothei's of Sir William Washington,* the son and heir of Lawrence 
Washington, of Sulgrave, emigrated to Virginia, and settled at Bridge's 
Creek, on the Potomac, in the county of Westmoreland.t John died 
in 1G97, leaving two sons, John and Augustine. Augustine was twice 
married. H,is second wife was Mary Ball, by whom he had six chil- 
dren, four sons and two daughters. George, his eldest (the subject of 
this sketch), was bom on the 22d| of Febi-uary, 1732, and was the sixth 
in descent from the first Lawrence Washington of Sulgi-ave. His fa- 
ther, soon after his birth, purchased an estate upon the Rappahannock, 
opposite Fredericksburg, where he lived at the time of his death, which 
occurred when George was little more than ten years of age. 

The cares of a large family devolved upon his young mother ; but, 
aided by a strong mind, she performed the duties of parent and guar- 
dian with the greatest fidelity and success, Sound moral training was 
her chief solicitude ; and she had the gratification of seeing all her chil- 
dren act well their part while upon the theatre of life. 

George received a common English education, and from his earliest 
years was studious and thoughtful. Such was his demeanor at school, 
that his companions always made him umpire in cases of dispute. His 
military propensities were early developed. He formed his school- 
companions into companies, who went through all the evolutions of 
military " children of larger growth," and fought mimic battles. George 
was always appointed commander of one of the parties. || Truth and 
strict integrity were his prominent characteristics.^ At the age of four- 

• He married a half-sister of George Villiers, duke of Backingham. 

t John was employed in a military command against the Indians, and rose to the rank of 
colonel. 

X The 11th of February. Old Style calendar. 

II At tlie age of fDnrteen years he applied for and obtained a midshipman's warrant in the 
Briti.^h navy. Hie mother induced him to relinquish it. 

$ The following is an illustration of his truthfulness. In company with other boys, be se- 
cured a fiery colt, belonging to his mother, yet unbroken to the bit, and mounted him. The 
alirighted animal dashed furiously across the fields, and in his violent exertions, burst a blood- 
vessel and died. The colt was a valuable one, and many youths would have sought an eva- 
sive excuse. Not so with George. He went immediately to hia mother, and, stating plainly 



GEORGE WASHINGTON. 



Hia pursuits. — Accompanies his brother to Barbadoes. — Appointed a commissioner to the French. 

teen he was a close student of geometry, and his mind seemed to de- 
light in thridding the intricacies of legal business?,* -He wrote consider- 
ably, and among his productions of childhood werd a series of " Rules 
of Behavior in Company and Conversatiffn" which contain many max- 
ims serviceable to the young and the old. * 

Although his father left a large estate, yet, when divided among his 
family, it was inconsiderable for each. Both inclination and prospec- 
tive necessity caused George to employ his youthful hours in industry, 
and he made surveying his profession. Through this, he became thor- 
c ughly acquainted with the border region of Virginia, and this knowl- 
edge afterward served him in the judicious purchase of land that greatly 
increased his private fortune. 

Such were his acknowledged capacities, that at the age of nineteen 
years he was appointed one of the adjutants-general of his state,* with 
the rank of major, which office he held but a short time. His brother 
Lawrence, who had been for some time suffering from a pulmonary 
complaint, resolved, under the advice of his physician, to seek health in 
the West Indies. Desirous of having a friend with him, and being 
much attached to George, he proposed to him to accompany him, which 
he did, and they sailed for Barbadoes in the autumn of 1751. There 
George had a severe attack of the small-pox, and the health of hia 
brother still remaining precarious, he returned home to accompany Law- 
rence's wife to Bermuda, whither he (Lawrence) was to go the next 
spring. During the summer Lawrence returned home and died, and 
George was appointed one of his executors, which trust he executed 
admirably, though young and inexperienced. 

The French having projected the bold design of uniting Canada and 
Louisiana by a chain of forts along the valleys of the Ohio and Missis- 
sippi, and having, indeed, took actual possession of territory on the Ohio 
claimed by Virginia, the authorities of that colony resolved to appoint 
a commissioner to confer with the French commandant, demand cessa- 
tion of further encroachments, and, if possible, ascertain their real de- 
signs. This delicate mission was intrusted to young Washington, then 
only twenty-one years of age. It was late in autumn when he started, 
and mid-winter before he returned. Over the rugged crags and through 
the deep ravines of the Alleganies, amid hostile savages, and sleet and 
snow, he made the dangerous journey, with only eight persons, and 
reached the French fort (Du Quesne, the site of the present city of Pitts- 
burg) in safety. He was politely treated by the commandant (St. Pierre), 

all the circumstances, asked her forgiveness, which, of course, was readily granted. Her 
reply is remarkable : " Young man, I forgive you, because you have the courage to tell the 
truth at once ; had you skulked away, I should have despised you." 

• The encroachments of the French, and the threatening attitude of the Indians, called tat 
a systematic training of all the militia of the state, for actual service. 



10 



LIVES OF THE PRESIDEJSTS. 



Expedition to Fort Du Quesne. — His defeat. — Accompanies Braddock. 

but the letter from that officer which he carried back to Governor Din- 
widdie was not at all satisfactory.* But so well did Washington pei-form 
his duty, that he received the public thanks of the Virginia assemoly.T 

The authorities of Virginia at once determined to raise a regiment of 
three hundred men, and send them into the disputed territory, to main- 
tain the rights of the English government. Colonel Fry was appointed 
to the chief command, and Major Washington was made lieutenant- 
colonel. Early in May the troops prepared to march. Washington 
was permitted to go on in advance Vith two companies, and on the 
27th of May he reached the Great Meadows. On the night of the 2Sth 
(it was very dark and stormy) he surrounded a party of sixty French- 
men who were near, under De Jumonville, and killed or captured the 
whole, except one man. 

Colonel Fry having died suddenly, Washington was appointed to the 
command of the regiment. He immediately erected a. fort (which he 
called Necessity) at the Great Meadows, expecting an attack from the 
enemy as soon as the defeat of De Jumonville should be known. Be- 
ing joined by some troops from New York and Carolina, he pushed 
forward toward Du Quesne ; but learning that the enemy, fifteen hun- 
dred strong, were marching to oppose him, he returned to Fort Neces- 
sity, where he v/as attacked, and after a resistance of ten hours, he was 
a July 3, obliged to capitulate." The terms were honorable to him, he 

^'^*- and his men being allowed to return to Virginia unmolested. 

In the spring of 1755, an expedition Under General Braddock was 
sent against the French and Indians. At the earnest solicitation of 
Braddock, Washington consented to serve as a volunteer in the character 
6f aid-de-camp.J After a toilsome march they reached the vicinity of 
Fort Du Quesne, and were suddenly attacked by an ambush. Braddock 
fell, mortally wounded,|| and the other superior officers having been killed 
or wounded, the troops fled in dismay. By great effiaits, Washington 
rallied them and made good their retreat, in perfect order, to Fort Cum- 
bei'land. The protecting hand of Providence was visible on this day. 
Washington rode in every direction during the engagement, distributing 



* The journal which he kept daring this expedition was published by authority, and made 
him very favorably known throughout the colonies. 

t Washington happening to enter the gallery of the assembly-chamber, was seen by the 
speaker, who immediately proposed a vote of thanks. Every member arose and saluted the 
young hero with a bow. He attempted to reply to the resolution of thanks, but his voice 
faltered. The speaker saw it, and thus complimented him: "Sit down, Major Wasliington; 
your modesty is alone equal to your merit." 

t Washington had left the anny on account of a regulation by which the colonial ofiScers 
were made to take rank lower than those of the regular army. 

II Washington, who well understood the Indian mode of warfare, attempted to advise Brad- 
dock in his movements, but the haughty commander refused his proffered knowledge, and 
disdainfully said : " What ! a young American buskin teach a British general how to fight !" 



GEORGE WASHINGTON. n 



Appointed conunander-in-chief of the Virginia forces. — Marries Mrs. Custla. 

the general's orders, and constantly exposed to the sharp-shooters of the 
enemy ; yet, although two horses were killed under him, and four bul- 
lets passed through his coat, he escaped unhurt * On returning to Vir- 
ginia, debilitated with sickness and fatigue, he left the service and re- 
turned to Mount Vernon, where his mother now resided, followed by 
the sincere blessings of the colonies.t 

The following year, the little colonial army of Virginia was newly 
organized, and Colonel Washington appointed to the chief command. 
A dispute concerning precedence having arisen between him and a Ma- 
ryland officer, who held a royal commission, he was sent to Boston to 
lay the matter, in person, before General SRirley, then commander-in- 
chief of the British forces in America. Washington's pretensions, based 
upon right, were sustained, and he returned to his field of duty,| where 
jealousy with busy tongue soon attempted to disparage his services, and 
rob him of the unbounded confidence of his countiymen, which he pos- 
sessed. The effort proved fruitless, and his enemies found that they 
were " biting a file !" For two years he performed the duties of com- 
mander-in-chief of the Virginia forces, under every discouragement, un- 
til, toward the close of 1757. he was seized with a fever which confined 
him four months at Mount Vernon. During the year follovnng, he was 
actively engaged, both in Virginia and on the borders, in operations 
against the French and Indians in that quarter, and at the close of the 
campaign he resigned his commission and retired to private life. The 
military scenes he had participated in gave him many advantages du- 
ring his subsequent exalted career^ 

At the age of twenty-seven years he married Mrs. Martha Custis,* 
widow of John Parke Custis, a lady about three months his j 
junior, every way worthy of him, and distinguished alike for ^^^^• 
her beauty, accomplishments, and wealth. She had two children, over 
whom Washington exercised all the care and solicitude of a father. 
The estate of Mount Vernon had been bequeathed to him by his broth- 
er Lawrence, and the fortune of his wife, added thereto, gave him the 
possession of ample means ; and from the stirring scenes of military life, 
where he had won much glory, he turned his attention to the peaceful 
pursuits of husbandry and the enjoyment of domestic life. For fifteen 

* It is related ^lat an Indian said that he hvAJifleen fair shots at him on that day, bat coald 
not l^it him. 

t The Rev. Mr. Davia, in a sermon preached soon after Braddock's defeat, nttered the 
following prophetic sentiment : " I can not but hope that Providence has preserved this youth 
to be the savior of his country." 

X While in New York, on his return from Boston, he was kindly entertained at the house 
of Beverly Robinson (at whose country mansion, near West Point, was the scene of Arnold's 
treason), and was there deeply smitten by the charms and rare accomplishments of Misa 
Phillips. But a rival — ^^a companion-in-arms at Braddock's defeat — Captain Morris, woood 
tad won her 



12 



LIVES OF THE PRESIDENTS. 



• 1765. 



Appointed a deputy in the first Continental Congress. — Appointed commander-in^hief of the Army. 

years he was thus employed, except when occasionally called to be a rep- 
resentative in the provincial assembly, or to the performance of some tem- 
porary public duty.* During the storm which the stamp-act aroused," 
although he was not very actively engaged in public opposi- 
tion, yet all that private influence, connected with some pub- 
lic acts, could do to roll back the tide of oppression, was done by him. 
When the tyrannical acts of Parliament (among which was the odi- 
ous Boston port bill) reached America, and produced a fever of patri- 
otic resistance, out of which emanated the first General congress in 
1774, Washington was appointed one of the deputies from Virginia 
So eminent were his militaiy abilities considered, that he was put upon 
every committee in that body whose services appertained to military 
affairs ; and he was exceedingly useful in arranging matters for future 
action. And when, the following year, the patriot army that sprang 
into powerful existence at the call of freedom, and invested Boston, the 
seat of executive oppression in America, was adopted by the Congi-ess* 

* June 14 ^^^ called the continental army, Washington was, by unani- 

^'''^- mous vote, called to the chief command. He accepted the 
appointment, but with much diffidence,! and dechned all compensation 
for his services,! asking only to have his necessaiy expenses paid. 

Immediately after his appointment, he proceeded to Cambridge, in 
Massachusetts, and took command of the continental army. Already 
eAprUi9. the blood of patriots had been spilled at Lexington,' and the 
J June 17. tragedy of Bunker Hill'' had been enacted; and he found the 
troops (about fourteen thousand in number) eager to vindicate and main- 
tain the honor and freedom of their country. But he vrisely deemed 
perfect organization and discipline more essential to the success of the 
cause than impetuous offensive warfare, and it was several months be- 
fore he attacked the British troops, in their supposed stronghold, in 
Boston. 

It would be impossible to trace in detail the career of Washington 

• He officiated as justice of the peace for a number of years. 

t The speech of Washington on this occasion, considering every circumstance, ia one of the 
most remarkable on record. He said, " Though I am truly sensible of the high honor done 
me in this appointment, yet I feel great distress, from a consciousness that my abilities and 
military experience may not he equal to the extensive and important trust. However, as the 
Congress desire it, I will enter upon the momentous duty, and exert every power I possess 
in this service, and for the support of the glorious cause. I beg they will accept my most 
cordial thanks for this distinguished testimony of their approbation. But lest some unlucky 
event should happen, unfavorable to my reputation, I beg it may be remembered by gentle- 
men in this room that I thbday declare, with the utmost sincerity, I do not think myself equal 
to the command I am honored with. As to pay, sir, I beg leave to assure Congress that as 
no pecuniary consideration could have tempted me to accept the arduous employment at tho 
expense of my domestic ease and happiness, I do not wish to make any profit from it I will 
keep an exact account of my expenses. Those, I doubt not, they will discharge, and that is 
aU I desire." 

% Congress Toted a salary of five hundred dollars a month for the commander-in-chief. 



GEORGE WASHINGTON. 13 

Evacuation of Boston. — Battle of Long Island. — Capture of Fort Washington. 

through the eventful scenes of the Revolution, within the very narrow 
limits prescribed for this sketch, and we shall be obliged therefore to 
take a mere bird's-eye view of it, refening our readers to the more vo- 
luminous biographies of the immortal chief with which our literature 
abounds. 

"Washington found himself at the head of an undisciplined army, scant- 
ily clothed, provisioned, and armed ; yet with all these discourage- 
ments, he attempted to expel the British from Boston, and fully suc- 
ceeded. They evacuated the town on the 17th of March, 1776. Gen- 
eral Howe, who commanded the British forces, sailed with them and 
about fifteen hundred loyalists, or tories, for Halifax, Nova Scotia, leav- 
ing behind him considerable arms and provisions. 

Washington's solicitude was now felt for the city of New York, whith- 
er he feared General Howe had sailed, and he immediatel^commenced 
his march toward that place. Early in July, the British land and naval 
forces, under the command of General Howe and his brother, Admii'al 
Lord Howe, arrived off Sandy Hook. They were accompanied by a 
large body of German mercenaries called Hessians. They first landed 
upon Staten island," and Washington prepared to receive ajuiya, 
them. Perceiving it to be their intention to land upon Long ^^^^• 
island, he sent a large portion of his army thither. Upon Brooklyn 
heights and vicinity a severe battle was fought, and the Americans were 
defeated with ereat loss.* Washington saw the hopelessness 

. , . ^ b Aug. 27. 

of success, and instead of waiting to renew the contest the 
next morning, he silently withdrew all his troops across the river at 
night, and placed them in an attitude of, defence upon York island. 
For more than forty-eight hours he was without sleep, and the most of 
the time on horseback.* 

After some slight skinnishing in the vicinity of Harlem, the Ameri- 
cans took post at White Plains, where a partial battle was fought, which 
was not decisive.' Washington retreated to Croton, while the „ „„ 

° ' . c Oct. 28. 

British commander marched back and took possession of 

^ d Not. 16. 

Foil Washington'' upon York island, with nearly three thou- 
sand Americans as prisoners. On hearing of this disaster, Washington 
with his army crossed the Hudson into New Jeraey, and for nearly 
three weeks he was closely pursued across that state by Comwallis. 
On the 8th of December he crossed the Delaware, taking with him all 
the boats, to prevent the enemy following. The British army entered 
Trenton at the moment the last boat of the Americans left it. 

• The American army had a very narrow escape from destnjction. FrorideDtially, a denia 
fog obscured all their movements, and their retreat was uuobserred by the enemy. When 
the fog rose, they saw the British taking posseasion of the spot which they occupied only an 
hour before. 



14 



LIVES OF THE PRESIDENTS. 



i Jan.3. 



Battles of Trenton, Princeton, Brandy wine, and Germantown. — Encampment at Vailey Forge. 

On the night of the 25th of December, Washington in person led a large 
detachment of his little ai-my across the Delaware, and about daybreak, 
in the face of a violent storm of snow, he attacked the British and Hes- 
sians. A squadron of Bi-itish dragoons and about five hundred infantry 
fled down the river at the first fire ; but about one thousand Hessians 
were taken prisoners, and before night were carried across the Dela- 
ware and secured. This glorious achievement sent a thrill of joy 
throuo-h the country, and fully restored and added to that confidence of 
the people in the abilities of the commander-in-chief, which late reveises 
had caused somewhat to wane. 

As soon as the prisoners were disposed of, Washington returned to 
Trenton," where he was met by a superior force under Com- 
i'''?, wallis. During the night he silently withdrew toward Prince- 
ton,* intending to attempt the capture of the enemy's stores at New 
Bininswick. Near Princeton he met a large detachment of the British 
army, and a severe battle ensued,* during which the brave 
General Mercer was mortally wounded. The Americans 
were successful. 

The British commander, being in possession of New York, was anx- 
ious to have Philadelphia also. During the spring he made ineffectual 
attempts to draw Washington from his strong position among the New 
Jersey hills, and finally, in' July,* embarked his troops and 
proceeded by the way of the Chesapeake. He landed at the 
head of Elk river on the 25th of August, and was met by Washington 
at the fords of the Brandywine, where a well-contested battle was 
fought,'' in which the Americans were defeated. On the 25th, 
the British entered and took possession of Philadelphia, and 
formed, soon after, their camp at Germantown, where they were at- 
tacked by the Americans.* The latter were repulsed with 
considerable loss, and took a strong position at Whitemarsh. 
Howe attempted to dislodge Washington, but failed, and finally went 
into winter quarters at Philadelphia. Washington, determined to de- 
fend the adjacent country and closely hem the British in the city, se- 
lected Valley Forge for winter quarters. 

Never did patriotism shine wdth a purer lustre than was exhibited in 
the patient sufferings of the American troops during their encampment 
at Valley Forge. The winter was a very severe one. The army was 
poorly clad, and many a bare footprint, marked with blood, was seen in 



c Jnly 5. 



d Sept 11. 



e Oct. 3. 



• At dawn, greatly to the surprise of the British, not an •American soldier was to be seen. 
" Where can Washington be gone 7" asked Cornwallis. A cannon was heard in the direc 
tion of Princeton : " There he is," replied Erskine, " rehearsing the tragedy of Colonel Ralle" 
(the Hessian commander killed at Trenton). " By Joyc !" cried Cornwallis, " he deserves to 
fight in the cause of hia king." 



-r^ 



GEORGE WASHINGTON, 



16 



Intrigues against Washington. — Battle of Monmouth. 



the snow when they marched into quarters in December. Huts were 
erected, but the scarcity of food and fuel made their sufferings intense. 
The keenest sympathies of the commander-in-chief were awakened,* 
and the fact that, amid all this misery, and with the gloomy prospect of 
defeat and destruction before them, the demon of mutiny scarcely 
showed its turbulent head, speaks volumes in praise of the influence of 
"Washington over his army, and their affectionate attachment to his 
person. 

While physical suffering all around him was preying upon the spirits 
of Washington, and he' was day after day urging Congress to do some- 
thing to relieve his famishing troops, jealousy and intrigue, among men 
in high places, were busy at the plumes of the comraander-in-chief, and 
laboring assiduously for his supercession. Gates had been successful in 
conquering Burgoyne at the north, and comparisons were drawn be- 
tween his services and those of Washington, in which the latter were 
disparaged.t But all the arts* of the faction to alienate the confidence 
and affection of the people and the army from Washington were vain. 
He deeply felt the injury, but instead of publicly vindicating his charac 
ter from the aspersions thrown upon it by an anonymous writer, and 
thus reveal to the enemy what he ought not to know, he chose rather to 
suffer the temporary opprobrium in silence, for his Country's good. 

Early in May, intelligence was received that France had acknowl- 
edged, by treaty, the independence of the United States ; and the expec- 
tation that a French fleet would speedily enter the Delaware, caused 
Sir Henry Clinton, who had just taken command of the British army, 
to evacuate Philadelphia. He crossed the Delaware into New Jersey,* 



a June \8, 

1778. 



closely pursued by Washington .J He was overtaken at Mon- 
mouth, where a severe battle cf several houi-s was fought,* and 
terminated only when night approached and they were over- * ^"°* ^8. 
come by excessive fatigue. Washington intended to renew the contest 
in the morning, and slept upon the battle-field " with his martial cloak 

• In a letter to Congress he said : " For some days there has been little less than famine in 
the camp. A part of the army have been a week without any kind of flesh, and the rest 
three or four days. Naked and starving as they are, we can not enough admire the incom- 
parable patience and fidelity of the soldiery, and that they have not been, ere this, excited by 
their sufferings to a general mutiny and dispersion." 

t A series of anonymoiis letters, signed " De Lisle," was published. It was afterward dis- 
covered that they were written by General Conway, a disappointed oflBcer, who failed of 
promotion. 

t Washington left Arnold (who had not recovered from wotmds received at'duebec) in 
command as military governor of Philadelphia. It was during his stay there that he fell into 
those extravagant habits and dishonest peculations which finally made him bankrupt, and oi>. 
noxious to the censures of Congress, which ordered for him a reprimand from Washington. 
This was done by the commander-in-chief in the most delicate manner ; but Arnold's pride was 
touched — his purse was empty — and he bargained for the sale of his country's liberties for 
• thirty pieces of silver," or rather for thirty thousand pounds sterling. 



16 



LIVES OF THE PRESIDENTS. 



Arduous duties of Washington. — Is appointed Licutenant-General and Vice-Admiral of France. 



« July 4. 



b May 12. 



around him." But under the cover of night the enemy suddenly with- 
drew, and reaching Sandy Hook, embarked for New York city." Wash- 
ington took post on the Hudson, and in this relative position 
the two armies went into winter quarters. 
The theatre of active military operations having been changed to the 
southern department of the confederacy, Washington was not peraon- 
ally engaged in them until the summer of 1780. His duties, however, 
were very arduous — sometimes exceedingly delicate — and he per- 
formed them amid the gi*eatest causes for despondency. Upon him 
rested, not only the whole control of the military movements of the frag- 
mental army, but the civil operations of the imperfect government de- 
manded his constant vigilance and influence. The alliance with France 
became too much the reliance of the people, and general apathy pre- 
vailed ; while in Congress, party dissensions threatened the complete 
frustration of all the plans of the commander-in-chief, and, indeed, the 
utter ruin of the cause.* But in the spring of 1780, a happy change in 
affairs took place. La Fayette, who was de'^rly loved by Washington,! 
went to France on parole, and assiduously labored while there to in- 
duce the government to send men and money in aid of the Americans. 
He succeeded, and early in May* he returned and brought the 
cheering intelligence that a large body of troops, under the 
count de Rochambeau, was already embarked. He also brought from 
the French king a commission to Washington, appointing him lieuten- 
ant-general of the armies of France, and vice-admiral of its fleets. 
Those commissions were intended to determine definitely the matter of 
precedence, so that no difficulty might arise on that account between 
Washington and De Rochambeau. He was thereby made commander- 
in-chief of all the military and naval forces which the French govern- 
ment might send to America. The cheering news brought by La Fa- 
yette greatly inspirited the Americans, and the militia flocked to AVash- 
ington's standard in large numbers. 

The French fleet an-ived at Newport in July,' but, after a 
conference which Washington held with the French officers at 
Hartford, in Connecticut,'' it was determined not to enter up- 
on offensive operations until the following spring. It was during that 

• Washington saw these things with the deepest pain, and in a letter to a friend, said, " In- 
deed, we seem to be verging so fast to destruction, that I am filled with sensations to which I 
have been a stranger nntil these three months. Our enemies behold with exultation»and joy 
how efiFectually we labor for their benefit : and from being in a state of absolute despair, and 
on the point of evacuating America, they are on tiptoe. Nothing, therefore, in my judgment, 
can save as, bat a total reformation in oar own conduct, or some decisive tarn of afiaira in 
Europe." 

t La Fayette entered the continental army jast before the battle of Brandywine, and, al- 
though very young, received from Congress the commission of a major-general. Soon after 
the battle of Monmooth, be made a visit to France. 



« July — . 
4 Sept 



GEORGE WASHINGTON. 



17 



Arnold's treason. — Etfects of Washington's perseverance. — Insurrection of troops. 



conference that Arnold, taking advantage of Washington's absence from 
his headquarters in the Highlands, attempted to consummate his acts of 
treason, and give a death-blow to American independence. But an 
ever-vigilant Providence intei-posed, and the cause of Freedom most sig- 
nally triumphed. Major Andre, the victim of the traitor's guilt, was 
hung, by Washington's consent," but only as a sacrifice to jus- Q^^ o 
tice and stern necessity, for the tears of generous sympathy* ^'^°- 
bfimmed the eyes of the commander-in-chief when he sio-ned the war- 
rant for his execution. 

During the autumn and winter, Washington was assiduously engao-ed 
in endeavors to reorganize the army ; but Congress was so tardy in its 
movements, and so deaf to his earnest appeals for more troops and 
longer enlistments,t that, as usual, his forces were reduced one half on 
the first of January by the termination of their enlistments. Yet he 
did not despond, although the main body of the British army was within 
a few hours' march of him, and most of the winter the Hudson was 
open to their ships. By his consummate skill and personal influence 
he managed to fill his ranks with recruits, and kept the enemy at bay. 
His pen was constantly busy in extensive con-espondence with his dis- 
tant officers and with governors of the states and influential individuals, 
— issuing orders and suggestions to the former, and soliciting aid from 
the latter. Thus he obtained money for the use of his almost famished 
and naked soldiers ; and he also induced the French government to send 
more money and another naval force to his aid. 

So grievous had become the destitute condition of the soldiers, that 
they determined to obtain from Congress by coercion what was denied 
them upon petition ; and on the 1st of January,' the whole 
Pennsylvania line, stationed at MoiTistown, consisting of about 
thirteen hundred troops, mutinied, and marched in the direction of 
Philadelphia, whei'e Congress was then in session. By the prudent 
management of Washington, and his promises to attend upon Congress 
in person in their behalf, he induced the soldiers to return to duty,| to 
Buffer and faintly hope, yet longer. 



i 1781. 



• Arnold, in his haste to escape, when he learned the capture of Andre, wrs obliged to 
leave his wife and infant child at his quarters, nearly opposite West Point. From the Vul- 
ture he wrote to Washington, justifying his conduct, and imploring his protection for his wife 
and chilti. That protection was tenderly extended, and she was safely conducted to New 
York. 

t His appeals had some effect upon Congress at last, and they issued orders for enlistments 
during the war, and voted that all the ofiScers should have half-pay for life. This latter propo^ 
•ition did not meet with general favor, and was subsequently changed to the payment of five 
years' full pay. 

t " We love and respect you," said the mutineers to General Wayne, who was sent by 
Washington to persuade them to return to duty — " we are not going to the enemy : on the 
contrary', were they now to come out, you should see us fight under your orders tvith as mach 



18 LIVES OF THE PRESIDENTS. 

Attempt to capture Arnold. — Siege of Yorkto^m, and capture of ComwnlHs. 

During the winter, Washington formed a plan for capturing Arnold* 
and his whole army, who were canying on a destructive predatory war- 
fare in Virginia. His scheme was an admirable one, but failed through 
the inefficient action of the French fleet, which was directed to blockade 
the principal ports of Virginia. He then determined to drive the ene- 
my from the city of New York, and for that purpose ordered the French 
allies to join him upon the Hudson. This was effected in July," but 
July 6 s^out the same time Sir Henry Clinton received a reinforce- 
1781. ment from Europe of about three thousand troops, and Wash- 
ington abandoned the design, and prepared to march to Virginia to as- 
sist Wayne and La Fayette in their operations against Cornwallis. He 
received a letter from the count De Grasse,* the commander of 

b Aug. 14. 

the French fleet then in the West Indies, assuring him that he 
«rould be in the Chesapeake early in autumn. Washington then di- 
rected La Fayette so to dispose of his forces as to prevent the escape 
of Cornwallis to Charleston, while with their united armies they might 
capture him. But Cornwallis, expecting aid by sea from Clinton, col- 
lected his whole force at Yorktown and strono^ly fortified it.* 

c Aug. 22. 

After providing for the defence of the northern posts, Wash- 
ington crossed the Hudson, with the whole allied army, and marching 
through New Jersey in the direction of Staten island, deceived Clinton 
into the belief that that was his point of destination. The British com- 
mander did not discover this ruse until the allied army crossed the Del- 
aware and were rapidly speeding southward. On their arrival at Wil- 
liamsburg-,'' in Virarinia, the French fleet was already in the 
d Sept. 14. ° ° . •' 

Chesapeake. On the 6th of October, Washington commenced 

the siege of Yorktown; and on the 19th, Cornwallis surrendei'ed — and 
seven thousand men, with a large amount of arms and military stores, 
fell into the hands of the Americans.! This event filled the whole 

alacrity as ever : but we will no longer be amased ; we are detennined on obtaining what is 
our just due." And when tlie British commander sent emissaries among them to seduce them 
to the ranks of the enemy, "See," said they, "he takes us to be traitors:" and they seized 
the emissaries and handed them over to Wayne for execution as spies. Being offered a re- 
ward for their apprehension, the revolters nobly refused it, saying that necessity forced them 
to revolt and demand justice from Congress, but they desired no reward for doing their duty 
to their bleeding country. 

* Arnold entered zealously into the service of his royal master, immediately after bis flight 
on board the Vulture. 

t Immediately after the surrender, Washington hastened to Eltham, thirty miles distant, 
where his wife was attending the bedside of her dying (and only) son, Mr. Custis. With all 
a father's "sorrow, the hero wept over him, and when he was laid in the grave, he hastened to 
Philadelphia, stopping briefly at Mount Vernon, for the first time in six years. 

It is related, that when the British soldiers were about to march out and lay down their 
arms at Yorktown, Washington said to the Americans, " My boys, let there be no exultation 
over a conquered foe ! When they lay down their arms, don't huzza : posteriti/ will huzza 
for you !" 



GEORGE WASHINGTON. 



19 



Cessation of hostilities. — Proposition to make Washington King. 

country with joy and exultation, and crushed the last dangerous vestige 
of British power in America.* This was the last military achievement 
in which Washington was personally engaged, and we shall now view 
him in the loftier gi'andeur of his moral character, standing between 
peace and war, discontent and governmental weakness, like Aaron with 
his censer, to stay the plague engendered by long years of hardship, and 
misery, and privation, and the alleged ingratitude of rulers, which threat- 
ened to destroy the child of Freedom just taking its first step in the nur- 
sery of nations. 

On the cessation of hostilities in 1782, and the opening of negotia- 
tions for peace with Great Britain, on the basis of the complete inde- 
pendence of the colonies, Washington, with his usual foresight, saw 
with deep concern the dangerous storm slowly gathering in the army. 
For a long time the soldiers had received no pay ; and so impoverished 
was the public treasury, and indeed the whole country, by the unceasing 
levies of an eight years' war, that tjie disbanding of the army was re- 
garded by reflecting men as an event pregnant with many dangers. 
The public faith was pledged, but Congress was impotent. Washing- 
ton prudently resolved to delay the time for disbanding the army as 
long as practicable ; and to keep the soldiers tranquil, he remained with 
them, and established his headquarters at Newburg, on the Hudson. 
There, during the autumn of 1782, the spirit of discontent was constant- 
ly manifested, and an event occunred which placed the patriotism of 
Washington in a more conspicuous light than it had ever before ap- 
peared. He received a letter from an old and highly-respected colonel 
of the army, expressing his distrust of a republican government, propo- 
sing the establishment of an independent monarchy, and intimating the 
desire of the army to make the commander-in-chief king. To this let- 
ter Washington made quick reply, sternly rebuking the writer, and de- 
clared that no event during the war had given him so much pain. Did 
ever patriotism beam with purer lustre ? How lofty must have been 
the devotion to his country, of that chief who, at the head of an army 
who adored him for his goodness, and at the very apex of general pop- 
ulaiity, could thus indignantly refuse a profFei'ed crown, and rebuke the 
man who presented it for acceptance ! 

• " At the dead of night," Bays Paulding, " a watchman in the streets of Philadelphia was 
heard to cry out, • Paat twelve o'clock, and a pleasant morning — Comwallis is taken !' All but 
the dead, resting in their last sleep, awoke at this glorious communication. The city became 
alive at midnight ; the candles were lighted, and figures might be seen flitting past the win- 
dows, or pushing them up, to hear the sound repeated, lest it should have been nothing but a 
dream. The citizens ran through the streets, to inquire into the truth ; they shook hands, they 

embraced each other, and they wept for joy Everybody believed the news, for all, 

even in the darkest days of the Revolution, had cherished a hope, which carried with it al- 
most the force of inspiration, that Washington would, beyond all doubt, one day give liberty 
to his country." 



20 LIVES OF THE PRESIDENTS. 

The "Newburg Address." — Washington's firmness. — The new Constitution. 

Early in the spring of 1783, the prevailing discontent of the troops 

reached its crisis. An anonymous inflammatory address was secretly 

circulated among the soldiers, « and a call for a meetinjr of the 

o March 10 ^ ° ^^^ . . . ,. , -, ° 

officers was made. Washmgton immediately called a general 
meeting of all the officers, in place of the irregular one. He aff'ection- 
tionately addressed his companions-in-arms, condemned the tone and 
spirit of the anonymous address, and then gave them the strongest 
pledge that he would use his utmost power to induce Congress to grant 
their demands. When he had concluded he immediately retired from 
the meeting, and exceedingly brief were the deliberations of the officers. 
They adopted resolutions, expressing their confidence in the justice of 
Congress, and thanked the commander-in-chief for the course he had 
pursued, and declared their unabated attachment to his person. 

During the summer, "Washington wrote a circular letter to the gov- 
ernors of the states, replete with patriotic sentiment, and this was soon 
followed by his admirable farewell address to the army. On the IStli 
of October, Congress proclaimed the disbanding of the continental anny ; 
and on the 4th of December, Washington bade a final adieu to his com- 
panions-in-arms, and hastened to Annapolis, where Congress was in 
b Dec 23 session, and resigned into its keeping* the commission which 
1783. }jg received from that body more than eight years before, ap 
pointing him commander-in-chief of the continental armies.* He then 
hastened to Mount Vernon, resolved there to pass the remainder of his 
days amid the pure delights of the domestic circle, and wear in private 
that crown of glorious renown so nobly won by gallant deeds and pa- 
tient sufferings for his country's good. In a letter written three days 
after his arrival home he said : " The scene is at length closed ; I feel 
myself eased of a load of public care, and hope to spend the remainder 
of my days in cultivating the affections of good men, and the practice 
of the domestic virtues." 

But his country, still in a distracted state, greatly needed his wisdom 
and forethought, and he was soon again drawn forth into active life. 
The inefficiency of the Articles of Confederation was felt by all reflecting 
men, and it was obvious that something must be done to remedy the de- 
fects, or anarchy and utter ruin would be the result. A convention was 

c Sept, called to revise those articles ;' and subsequently another was 

1786. -^ "^ 

(jMay held,'' when they were entirely laid aside, and a new and more 
^''®'- perfect constitution for the government of the country was 
*^7OT.'^'' adopted.' Washington was a member of that convention, and 
presided over its deliberations ; and when the government was organ- 
• On his way to Annapolis, he stopped at Philadelphia, and rendered in his accounts to the 
auditor-general. The whole amount of his expenditures during the war was only about sev- 
enty thousand dollars, and of this nearly ten thousand dollars was for procuring secret intelli- 
gence. 



GEORGE WASHINGTON. 21 

Washington elected and inaugurated President— State of the country. 

ized under the new constitution, and a president of the United States 
was chosen by ballot in the electoral college, Washington was elected 
by a unanimous vote. 

Two days after the intelligence of his election reached him," ^ ^ ^y jg. 
Washington " bade adieu to Mount Vernon, to private life and ^^^^• 
domestic felicity," and proceeded to New York, the seat of the federal 
government. His progi-ess thitherward from Alexandria was like a 
continued march of triumph, and in every place through which he passed 
congratulations and addresses met him on every side.* At Philadel- 
phia, a civic crown was placed upon his head ; and at Trenton, where 
he was met by a deputation from Congress, the highest honors were 
paid to him by the inhabitants.t At Elizabethtown Point he embarked 
in an elegant barge, rowed by thirteen pilots, and was received at the 
landing at Whitehall, in New York, by Governor Clinton and suite, 
amid the joyous acclamations of the citizens and strangers. On the 
30th of Apiil,* he took the inaugural oath on the balcony of 
the old Federal hall, in the presence of assembled thousands, 
and this act was the crowning one of the war of independence. 

Washington's administration commenced under the pressure of many 

embarrassments and discouragements. The treasuiy was empty, a 

heavy foreign and domestic debt weighed upon the government, foreign 

intrigue threatened serious trouble, and almost universal agitation at 

home made everything seem unstable. Two of the thiiteen states had 

not ratified the constitution, but they finally came into the Union — North 

Carolina in November, 1789, and Rhode Island in May, 1790. Violent 

political parties arose, whose distinctions are still faintly visible. The 

friends of the new constitution, with Washington and Adams at their 

• " So great were the honors with which he was loaded, that they could scarcely have 
failed to produce haughtiness in the mind of an ordinary man ; but nothing of the kind was 
ever discovered in this extraordinary personage. On all occasions he behaved to all men 
with the affability of one citizen to another. He was truly great, in deserving the plaudits of 
his country, but much greater in not being elated with them." — Ramsay, vol. ii., p. 345. 

t A triumphal arch was erected, under the direction of the ladies of the place, upon the 
crown of which was displayed in large characters, "December, 1776" (the day of the battle of 
Trenton). On the sweep of the arch beneath was this inscription : " The defender of the 
mothers leill also protect the daughters." On one side was arranged a row of girls, dressed 
in white, and carrying baskets of flowers ; in a second row stood the young ladies, and imme- 
diately behind them the man-ied ladies. The instant he passed the arch, the young girla 
strewed flowers before him, and sang the follovdng ode : — 

^ Welcome, mighty chief, once more, 
I Welcome to this grateful shore ; 

Now no mercenary foe 

Aims again the fatal blow — 

Aims at thee the fatal blow ; 

Virgins fair and matrons grave, 

Thoee, thy conquering arms did save, 

Build for thee triirniphal bowers ; 

Strew, ye fair, his way with flowers — 

Btrew your hero's way with flowers." 



■MiH- . 



22 LIVES OF THE PRESIDENTS. 

Hamilton's financial scheme. — The "Whiskey Insurrection." — Washington's cabinet. 

head, were called federalists, and those who had opposed the adoption 
of that insti-ument were denominated anti-federalists. But amid all of 
these embaiTassments and agitations, "Washington calmly guided the 
helm of state with a firm hand, and called to his aid some of the ablest 
men of the country.* 

The first session of Congress lasted about six months; and after the 
adjournment, Washington made a tour through the eastern states, and 
was everywhere gi-eeted with the most cordial welcome. 

At the second session of Congress, Hamilton presented his financial 
scheme, which established the course of the national policy, and govej-ned 
the fiscal acts of several subsequent administrations. This scheme pro- 
vided for the funding of the public debt ; the assumption of state debts 
by the general government ; for a system of revenue from duties on im- 
ports ; and an internal excise. During that session an act was passed 
providing for the permanent seat of the national government at the Dis- 
March trict of Columbia, During the third session of this Congress," 
^'^^- a national bank was incorporated ; a mint was established for 
the purpose of national coinage ; and the newly-created states of Ver- 
mont and Kentucky were admitted into the Union. The public credit 
became established, and general prosperity marked the progress of the 
confederacy. 

The second Congress met at Philadelphia, in 1791,* Du- 

J October. . , ^ . ° , . , ^ ' • t -n n 

nng the first session, an act, laymg a duty on domestic distilled 
spirits, produced considerable disturbance, and gave birth to lawless 
acts in the interior of Pennsylvania, called the " Whiskey Insurrection." 
Congress authorized the president to call out the militia, if necessary, 
c May *^° execute the laws ;' but Washington, unwilling to proceed to 
i''^^^. jjjg adoption of this stringent measure, issued a proclamation, 
exhorting the insurgents to desist. But it failed to effect its purpose, 
and so formidable became the rebellion, that in August, 1794, a force 
of fifteen thousand men was called out, which soon quelled the insiirrec- 
tion, and the laws were enforced. 

The second session of the second Congress'' was chiefly 

d 1792-'93. 

marked by a division of sentiment in Washington's cabinet, 
which gave him much trouble — Hamilton and Knox advising strong 
federal measures, while Jefferson and Randolph opposed them. The 
party in Congi-ess, coincident in views with the latter, were denominated 
republicans by Mr. Jefferson, and this became for a time their party- 

• He selected for his cabinet, Thoma.s JefferBon, as secretary of state ; Alexander Hamilton, 
secretary of the treasury ; Henry Knox, secretary of war; and Edmund Randolph, attorney- 
general. The ofSce of secretary of the navy did not exist until the presidency of the elder 
Adams. The judiciary consisted of John Jay, chief-justice of the supreme court; and John 
Kutledge, of South Carolina, James Wilson, of Pennsylvania, William Cashing, of Massachu- 
setts, Robert H. Harrison, of Maryland, and John Blair, of Virginia, associates. 



GEORGE WASHINGTON. 23 

Unanimously chosen president a second time. — Amval and conduct of Citizen Genet 

name. Much sympathy was felt by the Americans for the revolutionists 
in France, then lifting the curtain of the terrible drama which immedi- 
ately followed, and Jefferson and his party were in favor of extending 
aid to them, while Hamilton and othei's (among whom was the presi- 
dent) dissented from these views, and sought to maintain the United 
States in a position of neutrality, especially as Great Britain was then at 
war with France. 

Notwithstanding the violence of party feeling, when the time for the 
second presidential election arrived, and Washington had yielded to the 
earnest solicitations of his friends, and became a candidate for re-elec- 
tion, he received the unanimous vote of the electoral college ; a signal 
proof of the esteem and veneration of the people. On the 4th of March, 
1793, he was again inaugurated pi'esident, at Philadelphia. 

Citizen Genet, a minister appointed by the newly-created French re- 
public, arrived early in April, and at once sought to involve the Tfnited 
States in a war with Great Britain. He actually issued " letters of 
marque," or their equivalent, to armed vessels sailing from American 
ports, to cvuise against the vessels of every nation inimical to France 
Washington and his cabinet united in the opinion that it was the sound- 
est policy for America to keep aloof from Em-opean politics ; and ac- 
cordingly, on the 18th of April, the president issued a proclamation of 
neutrality. This act gi-eatly offended Genet, and he threatened to ap 
peal to the people. His conduct became so obnoxious, that the pres- 
ident demanded his recall, which demand was complied with, and M. 
Fauchet was appointed his successor.* 

The fii'st change made in Washington's cabinet was in December, 
1793, when Jefferson, after making his admirable report on the com- 
mercial I'elations of the United States with foreign nations, resigned the 
office of secretary of state, and was succeeded by Edmund Randolph.! 
On the 4th of Januaiy, 1794, Mr. Madison offered a series of resolutions 
m conformity with the report of Mr. Jefferson ; and these, together with 
important topics in the president's message, occupied Congress in angry 
debates until the middle of April. A large portion of the people were 
favorable to France, and insisted that all friendly to that nation should 
wear the national cockade of that people. The neglect of England to 
fulfil some of the stipulations of the treaty of 1783, produced a very 
hostile feeling toward that country, and these things combined caused 
an asperity of party feeling here that has never been surpassed. 

• M. Genet subsequently married a daughter of Governor George Clinton, and spent the 
remainder o!" his life in the United States. He is said to have introduced " democratic socie- 
ties" into his country, in imitation of the jacobin clubs in Paris, but they both were of short 
duration 

t Wiiliam Bradford, of Pennsylvania, was appointed attorney-general, to fill the vacancy 
caused by the promotion of Mr. Randolph. 



24 LIVES OF THE PRESIDENTS. 



Sends a special envoy to Great Britain. — Foul slanders uttere d against the president 

The president, deeming war with Great Britain inevitable, sent John 
Jay a special envoy thither, but the terms of a treaty which he made 
(the best he could effect) were so favorable to Great Britain, that party 
feelino- here was rather heightened than allayed * But the president 
was warmly sustained by his friends, and the excitement against the 
ti-eaty gradually subsided — not, however, without an exhibition of much 
acrimony toward the president by a few of the leaders of the opposition 
in Congress. Calumnies of the blackest character were unblushingly 
uttered. He was charged with violating the constitution in negotiating 
a treaty without the previous advice of the senate, and that he had 
drawn from the treasury, for his own private use, more than the salary 
allowed by the constitution ! These atrocious charges (particularly the 
latter) fell lifeless at the feet of the utterers, for amid all the violence 
of party feeling, the people never suspected the integrity of the chief 
magistrate.t 

During the summer of 1794, General Wayne made a successful cam- 
paign against hostile Indians on the northwestern frontier. Treaties 
were concluded with them, and, in conformity with stipulations in Mr, 
Jay's treaty, the Biutish gave up several forts in that region, and a per- 
manent peace appeared in prospect. 

During the remainder of Washington's administration, the acrimony 
of party spirit was kept up, the opposition having succeeded in electing 
a majority of the house of representatives for the fourth Congress, which 
convened in December, 1795. The administration had a majority i« 
the senate ; and the president, unmoved by the clamor of the opposition, 
and the calumnies put forth, went steadily on in the path of official 
duty, and at every step elevated his country in the scale of national 
greatness. 

M. Fauchet, the French minister, was succeeded by M. Adet, who 
arrived in June, 1795, bringing with him the flag of the French republic,| 
which, together with a letter from the " Committee of Public Safety," 

• The treaty was signed in November, 1794, arrived in the United States on the 7th of 
March, 1795, and was ratified by the senate on the 24th of June following, by precisely the 
constitutional majority. Subsequently, a demand was made by the lower house upon the 
president, for copies of the papers connected with the treaty : but as that branch of the legis- 
lature had nothing to do with treaty-making, the president properly refused compliance. The 
opposition had a majority, and they raised a furious storm throughout the whole country but 
w hen popular meetings were held, and the question fairly discussed, the views of the presi- 
dent were sustained. 

t " When possessed of the entire fact," says Jadge Marshall, " the public viewed with jnst 
indignation this attempt to defame a character which was the nation's pride. Americans felt 
themselves affected by this atrocious calumny on their most illustrious citizen, and its propa- 
gators were frowned into silence. 

X Mr. Monroe, the United States minister to France, had previously presented the American 
colors to that government, and they were placed with those of France in the hall of the nor 
tioual convention. 



GEORGE WASHINGTON. 25 

Mr. Jay's treaty. — Washington's Farewell Address. — Election of Mr. Adams. 

he delivered to the president on the 1st of January following. On the 
reception of the colors, Washington uttered a sentiment which ought to 
be dearly cherished by every philanthropist and freeman : " Bom, sir," 
said he, " in a land of liberty ; having early learned its value ; having 
engaged in a perilous conflict to defend it ; having, in a word, devoted 
the best years of my life to secure its permanent establishment in my 
country — my anxious recollections, my sympathetic feelings, a,nd my 
best wishes, are in-esistibly attracted wheresoever, in any country, I see 
an oppi'essed nation unfurl the banners of freedom." 

Mr. Jay's treaty with Great Britain, which was ratified by Congress 
in the previous year," was returned in February, 1796, ratified 
by the king of Great Britain ; and the president immediately 
issued a proclamation, enjoining all men to abide by its provisions 
This proclamation, issued by the president before it was acted on by 
Congi-ess, awakened the ire of the democratic opposition, and a strong 
debate ensued. The course of the president, however, was sustained. 

The peculiar relations with France were a source of much anxiety to 
Washington. The remembrance of the old alliance, and the struo-o^le 
for freedom in which the French people were involved, awakened his 
keenest sympathies ; but his prudent wisdom saw clearly the necessity, 
if American liberty was to be preserved, of maintaining strict neutrality, 
and the soundness of his judgment was soon made manifest.* 

After the adjournment of Congress in June,* the thoughts 
of the American people turned toward the third presidential 
election, and Washington was earnestly solicited to be a candidate.t 
He positively refused, and this intention was announced in his admira- 
ble " Farewell Address" — that noble political legacy which he left his 
countrymen. This address was received with the most profound re- 
spect throughout the country ; and several of the state legislatures or- 
dered it to be entered at length upon their journals, and all the others 
adopted resolutions expressive of their esteem and veneration for the 
person and character of the executive. 

The contest for the presidency was between John Adams and Thomas 
Jefferson ; and after a warm contest,| Mr. Adams was elected president, 
and Mr. Jefferson vice-president. 

On the 7th of December, Washington met Congress for the last time ; 

• Washington became dissatisfied with the course of Mr. Monroe in France. The French 
we.'s indignant because America had formed a treaty with Great Britain, and many spolia- 
tions were made, and American property was confiscated. Mr. Monroe, it was thought, did 
not maintain tlie rights of his countrymen with sufficient vigor, and he was recalled. 

t Unmistakeable indications that he would again receive the unanimous vote of the electoral 
college were manifest. 

X While the election was pending, the French minister attempted to influence the result by 
publishing an attack upon tne federal administration, charging it with violating solemn trea- 
ties with France. But his address produced no appreciable effect upon the election. 



26 



LIVES OF THE PRESIDENTS. 



Washington retires to private life. — Is appointed commandcr-tn-chief of the army. — Hia death. 

and in his address lie presented, in a clear and comprehensive manner, 
the position of the United States, actual and relative, and recommended 
several measuies which he deemed important to the national welfare. 
On the 4th of March, 1797, his second administration closed ; and after 
the inauguration of Mr. Adams, he proceeded to Mount Vernon, deter- 
mined to pass the remainder of his days in retirement. He had taken 
the hslm of government, when the vessel was amid the most dangerous 
rocks and shoals, and he resigned it to his successor upon a compara- 
tively smooth sea and with fair winds. He went into the retirement of 
private life attended by the blessings of his countrymen, and the respect 
and veneration of mankind, wherever his deeds and virtues were known. 

Crowds of friends and strangers flocked to Mount Vernon, and his 
coveted retirement was still remotes And he had hardly bid adieu to 
public life, ere the threatening belligerent attitude of France caused our 
government to bring its troops into the field for the defence of the coun- 
try, and Washington was at once appointed commander-in-chief of all 
the forces, which he accepted, but with the expressed stipulation that he 
should not be called into active service, unless the most urgent necessity 
demanded it. Fortunately, that necessity never occurred. 

Washington engaged again in agricultural pursuits wdth all the seem- 
ing vigor of his earlier years : and it was while riding about his estate, 
giving directions to his workmen, that he was exposed to a shower of 
rain that brought on his last illness. On the evening of the 13th of De- 
cember, 1799, he was attacked with a severe inflammation of the throat, 
which terminated his life in less than thirty hours thereafter. He was 
sensible of his approaching dissolution, and spoke as freely of it as the 
nature of his disease would allow, expressing his perfect resignation to the 
will of his Makei'. Between ten and eleven o'clock, on the evening of 
the 14th, he calmly expired, at the age of sixty-seven; and on Wednesday, 
the 18th, his body was deposited in the family tomb at Mount Veraon. 

Grief pervaded the hearts of the people, and tnily a nation mourned. 
Congress bestowed upon his memory all the honors it was capable of, and 
foreign governments testified their admiration of his character.* " Or- 
ators, divines, journalists, and writers of every class, responded to the 
general voice in all parts of the country, and employed their talents to 
solemnize the event, and to honor the memory of him who, more than 
any other man, of ancient or modern renown, may claim to be called 

THE FATHER OF HIS COUNTRY." 



• Bonaparte, then first consul of France, issued the following order to hia army on the 9th of 
February following : " Washingtojj is dead ! This great man fought against tyranny ; he 
established the libertj- of his country. His memory will always be dear to the French people, 
E9 it will be to all freemen of the two worlds ; and especially to French soldiers, who, like him 
and the American soldiers, have combated for liberty and equality." He also ordered that for 
ten day^ black crape should be saspended from all the standards throughout the republic. 



n 



JOHN ADAMS, 

THE SECOND PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES. 




HE immediate successor of Washington in the presi- 
dential chair was John Adams, who was vice-president 
duiing the eight years' administration of the great chief. 
He was born on the 30th of October, 1735, in that por- 
tion of the town of Braintree, in Massachusetts, near Bos- 
ton, afterward incorporated by the name of Quincy. He 
was the fourth in descent from Henry Adams, who, in 1630, fled from 
Devonshire, England, to escape the persecutions fostered by Archbishop 
Laud, the ecclesiastical adviser of Charles I. A maternal ancestor was 
one of the pilgrim fathers who came passenger in the May Flower, 

Mr. Adams's primary education was received in his native town, and 
at the age of eighteen years" he was admitted into Harvard 
university, at Cambridge, where in 1755 he graduated with 
the usual honors, although his collegiate course was not marked by any 
remarkable ti'ait of character. 

Having chosen the law as a profession, he was placed under the tui- 
tion of James Putnam, an eminent barrister in Worcester,* through 
whom he became acquainted with Jeremy Gridley, attorney-general of 
the province, and was allowed free access to his library, a rare oppor 
tunity for a young student at that time.t Through the influence of Mr. 
Gridley, he was admitted to practice in the courts of Suffolk county, 
and he soon became extensively and favorably known. He was admit- 
ted as a baiTister in 1761, and as his acquaintance with public men in- 
creased, the early bias of his mind in contemplating political subjects 
developed itself in action. He began to pay much attention to the poli- 

• According to the usage of the times, ^oung Adams supported himself during his studies, 
by teaching a grammar-school. 

t Mr. Gridley took him into his room, and, op If about to communicate some great secret to 
him, he pointed to the book-case and said, ' TrVjre is the secret of my eminence, of which 
you may avail yourself, if you please." 



30 LIVES OF THE PRESIDENTS. 

Adams enters the political arena. — Member of the Massachusetts Assembly. — Member of Congress. 

tics of the country, and was brought into general notice as a politician 
by the publication of an essay written by him, on crown and feudal law, 
which was a bold appeal to the people, then excited by the late passage 
of the stamp-act." In 1764, he married Abigail, the highly- 
accomplished and well-educated daughter of the Rev. William 
Smith, of "Weymouth, and grand-daughter of Colonel Quincy. He re- 
moved to Boston in 1766, where he became intimately associated with 
James Otis, Samuel Adams, John Hancock, and others, in all their pa- 
triotic movements. So manifest were his talents and grooving popu- 
larity, that the royal governor, Bernard, attempted to detach him from 
the patriots, and secure his services for the crovni. He was offered the 
lucrative office of advocate-general in the comt of admiralty. But view- 
ing this offer as a covert attempt" to woo him from his principles, he 
promptly rejected it, choosing rather to suffer govemmental con- 
tumely. 

Mr. Adams was chosen representative for Boston in the Massachusetts 
assembly in 1770, and it was during that year that the " Boston massa- 
cre" occurred. With a generosity well becoming a true patriot, he vol- 
unteered to act as counsel for Captain Preston (British) and his men, 
who fired upon the inhabitants. Captain Preston was acquitted ; and 
so manifestly pure were the motives of Mr. Adams, that he lost no favor 
with the people. 

In the legislature, Mr. Adams was foremost in opposing the measuies 
of the rCyal governors, and wi'ote considerably for the American patriot 
newspapers.* He was elected a member of the Massachusetts council 
in 1774, but was rejected by Governor Gage.+ During that summer he 
was elected a member of the Continental Congress which convened at 
Philadelphia in September, and he was one of the most active men in 
that body. He was re-elected the following year, and it was by his 
motion that the American army, then investing Boston, was adopted by 
Congress under the title of the " Continental Army." He advised the 
appointment of Washington to the chief command of the armies, and 
seconded the motion for that appointment ; and the following year (1776) 
he stood side by side with Richard Henry Lee, Patrick Henry, and 
othei's, in boldly advocating a declaration of independence.! The 
measure was considered by Congi'ess, and he was one of a committee 

• He wrote a series of articles for the " Boston Gazette," in reply to some essays signed 
" Massacliusitensis,'' written by Sewall, the attorney-general. His essays were entitled " Nov 
Anglus, ' and excited a good deal of attention,, both at home and in England, being considered 
by the bonie-governmeut dangerous to the transatlantic power of the British crown. 

t It was in the first assembly under Governor Gage, of which Adams was a member, that 
the proposition for a general Congress was adopted., in spite of the governor's attempts to pre- 
vent such a treasonable act, as he deemed it. 

X He introduced a resolution (hat " the colonies shonld form goveramenta independent of 
the crown.'' 



JOHN ADAMS. 31 



Appointed minister to the court of France. — Also to the court of Great Britain. 

who reported a draft ;* and he subsequently signed the glorious instru- 
ment.t 

After the battle on Long Island, he was appointed by Congress, with 
Dr. Franklin and Edward Rutledge, to meet Lord Howe in conference 
upon Staten island, concerning the pacification of the colonies. The 
mission failed, according to his prediction. About this time he was 
chosen a member of the Massachusetts council, and was also appointed 
chief-justice of their highest courts. The latter honor he declined, pre- 
ferring to devote his time and talents to the general welfare of the coun- 
try, and no man in Congress labored as he labored. | 

In December, 1777, Mr. Adams was appointed to succeed Silas 
Deane as commissioner to the court of France ; but finding that the im- 
mediate object of his mission had been accomplished by Di*. Franklin, 
who had been appointed minister plenipotentiary, he asked for and ob- 
tained his recall in 1779. Immediately after his return he was chosen 
a member of the Massachusetts convention for framing a constitution, 
and his draft (he being on a committee for the purpose) was adopted 
with very little alteration. 

On the 29th of September, 1779, he received the appointment from 
Congress of minister plenipotentiary for negotiating a peace with Great 
Britain. He arrived in Paris in February, 1780, and in August he re- 
paired to Amsterdam, where for two years he labored assiduously for hm 
govemment.il He negotiated a loan of eight millions of guilders (about 

♦ The committee consisted of Thomas Jefferson, John Adams, Benjamin Franlilin, Roger 
Sherman, and Robert R. Livingston. 

t He wrote to a friend the following letter on the occasion : — 

" Philadelphia, July 5, 177G. 

" Sir : Yesterday the greatest qnestiou was decided which was ever debated in America, 
and greater, perhaps, never was or will be decided among men. A resolution was passed, 
without a dissenting colony, that these United States are, and of right ought to be, 

FREE AND INDEPENDENT STATES. 

" The day is passed. The fourth of July, 1776, will be a memorable epoch in the history 
of America. I am apt to believe it will be celebrated by succeeding generations as a great 
anniversary festival. It ought to be commemorated as the day of deliverance, by solemn acts 
of devotion to Almighty God. It ought to be solemnized with pomp, shores, games, sports, 
guns, bells, bonfires, and illuminations, from one end of the country to the other, from this 
time forward for evermore. You will think me transported with enthusiasm, but I am not. I 
am well aware of the toil, and blood, and treasure, that it will cost to maintain this declara- 
tion, and support and defend these states : yet through all the gloom I can see the rays of light 
and glot-y — I can see that the end is worth more than all the means, and that posterity v/ill 
triumph, though you and I may rue, which I hope we shall not. 

"I am, &c., "John Adams." 

t Daring the remainder of 1776 and 1777, he waa a member of ninety different committees, 
and chairman of twenty-five. » 

II As a proof of the unbounded confidence of Congress in him, credentials were sent him, 
constituting him minister plenipotentiary for making peace; for making a treaty of commerce 
with Great Britain ; the same to the states-general of Holland ; to the prince of Orange and 
Btadtholder ; for pledging the faith of the United States as a party to the armed neutrality 
and a commissioner to negotiate a loan of ten millions of dollars. 



32 LIVES OF THE PRESIDENTS. 



Appointed commissioner to European powers. — His first interview with tiie king of Great Britain. 

three millions of dollars), and a treaty of amity and commerce with Hol- 
land. In 17S1, he was associated with Franklin, Jay, Laurens, and Jef- 
erson, as a commissioner to conclude treaties of peace with the Euro- 
pean powers ; and in 1783, he was engaged in negotiating a commercial 
treaty with Great Britain, and was the first of the American commission- 
aSept 3 ^^^ ^^^^ signed the definitive treaty of peace with that power.* 

1783. jjj 1784, Mr. Adams returned to France ; and in January* he 

b 1785. •y^ras appointed minister for the United States at the court of Great 
Britain. He occupied that post with honor to himself and his country* 
until 1788, when, by his own request, his resignation was accepted, and 
he returned home. For his various and eminent services abroad, as 
well as at home, the acceptance of his resignation by Congress was 
coupled with expressions of thanks and profound regard. 

Mr. Adams sent to Mr. Jay an interesting account of his first inteniew 
with the king, from which we make the following extract. He was in- 
troduced to his majesty by the marquis of Carmarthen. He says : — 

" I went with his lordship through the levee-room into the king's clos- 
et ; the door was shut, and I was left with his majesty and the secretary 
of state alone. I made the three reverences — one at the door, another 
about half way, and the third before the presence — according to the 
usage established at this and all the northern courts of Europe, and then 
addressed myself to his majesty in the following words : — 

*' ' Sir, the United States have appointed me their minister plenipo- 
tentiary to your majesty, and have directed me to deliver to your majesty 
this letter, which contains the evidence of it. It is in obedience to their 
express commands, that I have the honor to assure your majesty of their 
unanimous disposition and desire to cultivate the most friendly and lib« 
eral intercourse between your majesty's subjects and their citizens, and 
of their best wishes for your majesty's health and happiness, and for that 
of your royal family. The appointment of a minister from the United 
States to your majesty's court will form an epoch in the history of Eng- 
land and America. I think myself more fortunate than all my fellow- 
citizens, in having the distinguished honor to be the first to stand in your 
majesty's royal pi*esence in a diplomatic character ; and I shall esteem 
myself the happiest of men, if I can be instinimental in recommending 
my country more and more to your majesty's royal benevolence, and of 
restoring an entire esteem, confidence, and affection, or, in better words, 
"toe Did good-nature, and the old good-humor," between people who, 
though separated by an ocean, and under different governments, have the 
same language, a similar religion, and kindred blood. I beg your majes- 
ty's permission to add, that although I have sometimes before been in- 

• During his residence in England, he wrote an elaborate and able defence of the Avasricsa 
conatitatiooa. 



JOHN ADAMS. 



33 



Elected ^ice-president of the United States under Washington. — Elected president 

trusted by my country, it was never, in my whole life, in a manner so 
agi'eeable to myself.' 

" The king listened to every word I said, with dignity, it is true, but 
with an apparent emotion. Whether it was the nature of the interview, 
or whether it was my visible agitation, for I felt more than I could ex- 
press, that touched him, I can not say, but he was much affected, and 
answered me with more tremor than I had spoken with, and said : — 

" ' Sir, the circumstances of this audience are so extraordinary, the lan- 
guage you have now held is so extremely proper, and the feelings you have 
discovered so justly adapted to the occasion, that I must say that I not only 
receive with pleasure the assurances of the friendly disposition of the peo- 
ple of the United States, but that I am very glad the choice has fallen 
upon you tote their minister. I wish you, sir, to believe, and that it may 
be understood in America, that I have done nothing in the late contest 
but what I thought myself indispensably bound to do, by the duty which 
I owed to my people. I will be very frank with you. I was the last to 
conform to the separation ; but the separation having been made, and 
having become inevitable, I have always said, as I say now, that I would 
be the first to meet the friendship of the United States as an independent 
power. The moment I see such sentiments and language as yours pre- 
vail, and a disposition to give this country the preference, that moment 
I shall say, Let the circumstances of language, religion, and blood, have 
their natural and full effect.' ' 

The constitution, which was adopted while he was absent, received 
his hearty approval ; and he was put upon the ticket with Washington, 
as vice-president, and elected.* In 1792, he was re-elected to 
the same office ; and in 1796, he was elected to fill the presi- 
dential chair, about to be vacated by Washington. He was inaugurated 
president on the 4th of March, 1797. Mr. Jefferson, who was elected 
vice-president, although his political opponent, paid a just tiibute to his 
worth, in his speech at his first meeting with the senate, and expressed 
a devout wish that he might " be long preserved for the government, 
happiness, and prosperity, of the country." 

Mr. Adams's administration commenced at a time when the insane 
republic of France was threatening war with the United States because 
of its proclaimed neutrality respecting European affairs. But the firm 
ness of the president was equal to the occasion ; and having retained in 
office the cabinet left by Washington, he was fully sustained in his 
measiu'es by his advisers.* 

Our relations with France requiring prompt action, the president 
convened Congi'ess in May, and found a decided federal majority in 



b 1789. 



• Secretary of state, Timothy Pickering ; of the treasury, Oliver Wolcott ; of war, Jaraes 
M'Henry ; attorney-general, Charles Lee : all members of the federal party. 



34 LIV^ES OF THE PRESIDENTS. 

Takes Bti'ong measures against France. — Appoints three envoys to treat ■vvith France. 

both branches of the legislature. Many of the democratic party, dis- 
gusted with the course of the French rulers, voted with the federalists. 
Resolutions of neutrality were adopted ; the president was authorized 
to call out a force of eighteen thousand men to protect the republic ; 
and a small navy was created.* A duty was laid on stamped paper fur 
business purposes, and additional duties were laid upon some other arti- 
cles for the purpose of revenue : but the very name of " stamp-act" was 
too odious to be popular, and it was soon repealed. During the sum- 
mer, our ministers to France, Pinckney and Marshall, were expelled 
from that country because they would not listen to the terms of French 
negotiation for peace, which demanded money from the Uivited States 
as the price thereof.! 

The fifth Congress again met in November, 1797, and continued in 
session over eight months. They passed acts for maintaining neutrali- 
ty ; protecting the seacoast ; fortifying seaports ; for loaning money and 
levying a direct tax on real estate to meet the expenses of the antici- 
pated war with France. A non-intercourse act was passed;" aime 
merchant-ships were allowed to go armed to the West Indies ; •'■^'■**- 
and an increase of the army was authorized. The president receivea 
addresses from all parts of the country, commending his firm course 
and breathing the very spirit of patriotism.| Washington Avas appoint- 
ed commander-in-chief of all the forces ; but it having been stipulated 
that he should not be called into active service, General Hamilton took 
the command of the army that was raised in 179S. The celebrated 
•' alien and sedition laws"[| were passed during the session of 1798, and 
were very unpopular, because of the liability of abuse by the president. 
The legislatures of Vii-ginia and Kentucky declared them to be gross 
infractions of the constitution, and appealed to other states to join in 
opposition. At the second session thereafter, they were repealed. 

Toward the close of 1798, the president had intimations that one or 
more envoys would be favorably received by France for the purpose of 
negotiating a peace. Without consulting his cabinet (in which divided 
counsels had lately appeared), he nominated to the senate Mr. MuiTay, 

* Benjamin Stoddert, of Maryland, was appointed secretary of tlie navy in 1798. 

t It was on thia occasion that Mr. Pinckney uttered the sentiment that met a hearty re- 
sponse throughout the Union : " Millions for defence, but not one cent for tribute." During 
tlie session of that year, Congress appropriated a million of dollars for the construction of ships. 

t It was at this lime that Robert Treat Paine wrote the celebrated song, " Adams and 
Liberty." 

II The former authorized the president to expel from the United States any foreigner who 
Bhould be found or supposed to be conspiring against the peace or authority of the republic. 
The latter put restrictions upon the libei-ty of the press in the power of the president. To 
this dangerous measure the opposition specially objected, because, of the two hundred news- 
papers then published in the United States, about one hundred and seventy-five wcro sup- 
porters of the federal administration. 



« i^' 



JOHN ADAMS. 35 



Envoys sent toFreince. — Mr. Jefferson elected president. 



Oliver Ellsworth, and Patrick Henry, as envoys, and the nomination 
v^^as confirmed.* This act offended his cabinet, and the breach j ^^.^^ 
was never healed. Hamilton and others highly disapproved •^'^^^* 
of his course, deeming it to be, the duty of France to take the first posi- 
tive step toward a reconciliation. Mr. Henry declined the service, and 
William R. Davis, of North Carolina, was substituted. They sailed for 
France in November, 1799, and on their arrival, they found Napoleon 
Bonaparte created first consul. He at once appointed three commis- 
sioners ; and in October, ISOO, a treaty of peace was ratified by the 
French government. It was conditionally confirmed by the president 
and senate before the close of Mr. Adams's term. Two articles hav- 
ing been left open for alteration, they were settled after the commence- 
ment of Mr. Jefferson's administration. They related to indemnifica- 
tion for depredations upon our commerce. 

On the assembling of the sixth Congress in December, 1799, there 
was a decided federal majority in both houses, and Theodore Sedgwick, 
of Massachusetts, was elected speaker of the house of representatives. 
On the 18th of the month, Mr. Marshall, of Virginia, announced to 
Congi-ess the intelligence of the death of Washington. Both houses 
adjourned ; their respective halls were dressed in mourning, and every 
demonstration of respect and giief was shown. During this session, 
acts prohibiting the slave-trade were passed ; also for laying additional 
duties on various articles ; and the northwest territory (now Oliio and 
Indiana) was admitted into the Union.* 

As the time approached for another presidential election, party spirit 
ran high. The federalists nominated for president and vice-president, 
Mr, Adams and General Charles C. Pinckney ; and the democrats nom- 
inated Thomas Jefferson and Aaron Burr. Owing to various causes, 
Mr. Adams had lost some of his firmest supporters, and Hamilton pub- 
lished a pamphlet against the course of conduct pursued by Mr. Adams 
during his administration. The final result was, that Jefferson and Burr 
were elected. Between the time of the decision of the electoral collen^e 
and the 4th of March, Mr. Adams appointed all the judges of the new 
courts, and their commissions were issued ; but the repeal of the law 
early in the administration of Mr. Jefferson, deprived them of their of- 
fices.t On the 4th of March, ISOl, the administration of Mr. Adams 
closed, and Mr. Jefferson was inaugurated at the newly-erected capitol 
jn Washington city. 

The course pursued toward France by Mr. Adams met with general 
approval, until he began to adopt what was termed humiliating ireas- 

• Wm. H. Harrison (the late president) took his seat as the first delegate from that territory, 
t They were called " the midnight judges of John Adams," because of the hour when the 
law under which they were created was adopted. 



„_f 



■*^</' 






36 LIVES OF THE PRESIDENTS. 

Mr. Adams retires to private lite. — His death. — His person and character. 

ures for conciliating that government. Tliese, together with the abrupt 
dismissal of two members of his cabinet near the close of his administra- 
tion, made him quite unpopular ; and he had the misfortune to leave the 
presidential chair unsupported by the confidence of his own political 
party. He was an honest man, and strongly confident in his own judg- 
ment. He therefore acted in accordance with that judgment, careless 
of the opinions of others. It was this trait of character that lost him his 
popularity when his official position allowed him a large scope for the 
exercise of his will. 

In 1801, he retired to his estate in Quincy, and never again ap- 
peared actively in the political field, but gave his support generally to 
the democratic party. He was favorable to the measure declaring war 
against Great Biitain in 1812, and he had the gratification of seeing his 
son at the head of a commission to treat for peace with the same nation 
that, thirty-two years before, he had treated with. 

In 1816, he was placed by the democrats of Massachusetts at the 
head of their list of presidential electors. In 1818, he lost his wife by 
death, with whom he had lived fifty-two years.* In 1824, he was cho- 
sen a member of the state convention of Massachusetts to revise the 
constitution, and was elected president. He declined the honor on ac- 
count of his age. In 1825, he had the rare pleasure of seeing his son 
elevated to the office of president of the United States. 

Mr. Adams had now entered upon the last decade of a century, and 
his long life had been one of arduous toils and spotless purity of charac- 
ter. His last years were years of serene tranquillity ; and as the semi- 
centennial anniversaiy of the signing of the Declaration of Independence 
approached, his hour of dissolution drew nigh. On the morning of the 
4th of July, 1826, being asked for a toast for the day, the last words he 
ever uttered — words of glorious import — fell from his lips : " Indepen- 
dence for ever.'' About one o'clock in the afternoon he calmly expired, 
and nearly at the same hour the soul of Thomas Jefferson, his compa- 
triot and friend, accompanied his to the spirit-land. 

In person, Mr. Adams was of middle stature, and rather inclined to 
be fleshy. He possessed an exceedingly intelligent countenance, and 
moral courage of the truest stamp ever marked it. In speaking, he was 
slow and deliberate, except when excited, and then he manifested great 
energy. He was a pure moralist and consistent Christian , and he left 
behind him a name to be coveted by the wise and good. 

• She is represented as a woman of remarkable intelligence, and exceedingly amiable. She 
heartily espoased the cause of independence, and made willing personal sacrifices for her 
country's gooi In a letter to a friend in London, written in 1777, she remarked : " To this 
cause I have sacrificed much of my own personal happiness, by giving up to the councils of 
America one of my nearest connexions, and living for more than three years in a state of 
widowhood." 



"-^ 













THOMAS J-EFFERSON, 

THE THIRD PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES. 




MEE.ICAN history presents few names to its students 
more attractive and distinguished than that of Thomas 
Jefferson, and rarely has a single individual, in civil 
station, acquired such an ascendency over the feelings 
and actions of a people, as was possessed by the sub- 
ject of this brief memoir. To trace the lines of his 
character and career is a pleasing task for every American whose mind 
is fixed upon the political destiny of his country, and we regret the nar- 
row limits to which our pen is confined. 

Mr. Jefferson's family were among the eai'ly British emigrants to 
V^irginia. His ancestors came from Wales, from near the great Snow- 
don mountain. His grandfather settled in Chesterfield, and had three 
sons, Thomas, Field, and Peter. The latter married Jane, daughter of 
Isham Randolph, of Goochland, of Scotch descent; and on the 13th of 
April, 1743, she became the mother of the subject of this sketch. They 
resided at that time at Shadwell, in Albemarle county, Virginia. Thom- 
as was the eldest child. His father died when he was fourteen years 
old, leaving a widow and eight children, two sons and six daughters- 
He left a handsome estate to his family ; and the lands, which he called 
Monticello, fell to Thomas, where the latter always resided when not 
engaged in public duty, and where he lived at the time of his death. 

Thomas entered a grammai'-school at the age of five years, and when 
nine years old he commenced the study of the classics with a Scotch 
clergyman named Douglas. On the death of his father, tne Rev. Mr, 
Maury became his preceptor ; and in the spring of 1760, he entered 
William and Mary college, where he remained two years. From Dr 
William Small, a professor of mathematics in the college, he received 
his first philosophical teachings, and the bias of his mind concerning 
subjects of philosophical investigation seem to have received its initial 
impetus from that gentleman. Through his influence, in 1762, young 



^ 



40 LIVES OF THE PRESIDENTS. 

Jefferson's intellectual character. — His marriage. — His political pamphlet 

Jefferson was admitted as a student-at-law in the office of George Wythe, 
the intimate friend of Governor Fauquer, at whose table our subject 
became a welcome guest. 

" Mr. Jefferson," said Wirt, in his eulogy on Adams and Jefferson, 
" by birth; belonged to the aristocracy : but the idle and voluptuous life 
which marked that order had no charms for a mind like his. He rel- 
ished better the strong, unsophisticated, and racy character of the yeo- 
manry, and attached himself, of choice, to that body. He was a repub- 
lican and a philanthropist, from the earliest dawn of his character. He 
read with a sort of poetic illusion which identified him with every scene 
which his author spread before him. Enraptured with the brighter ages 
of republican Greece and Rome, he had followed with an aching heart 
the march of history, which had told him of the desolation of those fair 
est portions of the earth ; and had read, with dismay and indignation, of 
that swarm of monarchies, the pi'ogeny of the Scandinavian hive, under 
which genius and liberty were now evei-ywhere crushed. He loved his 
own country with a passion not less intense, deep, and holy, than that 
of his great compatriot, John Adams ; and with this love he combined 
an expanded philanthropy which encircled the globe. From the work- 
ing of the strong energies within him, there arose an early vision, too, 
which cheered his youth and accompanied him through life — the vision 
of emancipated man throughout the world." 

In 1765, while yet a student, Jefferson heard the celebrated speech 
of Patrick Henry against the stamp-act ; and fired by its doctrines, he 
at once stood forth the avowed champion of American freedom. So 
manifest were his talents, that in 1769 he was elected a member of the 
Virginia legislature, and became at once active and popular there.* 
He filled that station until the period of the Revolution, when he was 
called to the performance of more exalted duties in the national council. 
He was married in January, 1772, to Mrs. Martha Skelton, a wealthy 
widow of twenty-three, who was the daughter of John Wayles, an emi- 
nent Virginia lawyer. 

When the system of committees of correspondence was established in 
1773, Mr. Jefferson was a member of the first committee in Virginia, and 
was very active with his pen. In 1774, his powerfully-written pamph- 
let was publisl^ed, called "A Summary View of the Rights of British 
America." It was addressed to the king, and was published in England 
ander the auspices of Edmund Burke.t 

• He made strong but unsuccessful efforts in the Virginia assembly for the emancipation 
of the slaves. 

t This pamphlet gave great offence to Lord Dunmore, the royal governor af Virginia, who 
threatened to prosecute him for high-treason. And because his associates in the Virginia as- 
sembly sustained Jefferson, Dunmore dissolved it. They assembled in a private capacity, 
and drew up a remonstrance, which had a powerful effect upon the people. The governor 
perceived that his acts were futile, and he allowed the matter to rest. 



«!l 



THOMAS JEFFERSON. 



41 



Draught3 the Declai-ation of Independence. — Appointed to revise tlie laws of Virginia. 

He was elected a delegate to represent Virginta iii the continental 
Congress of 1775, and for several years he wns one of the most efficient 
members of that body. He soon became distinguished among the men 
of talents there, although cojnparatively young ; and when, in the suc- 
ceeding year, a committee wtn^'s^ppointed to draught a Declaration op 
Independence, he was chosea one of the members. Although the 
youngest member of the committee, he was requested by the others to 
draw up the instrument, which he did, and his draught was adopted, with 
a very few verbal amendments, on the 4th of July, 1776. This instru- 
ment forms an everlasting monument to his memory, and gives by far a 
wider range to the fame of his talents and patriotism than eloquent pan- 
egyric or sculptured epitaph. 

During the summer of 1776, he was elected to a seat in the Virginia 
assembly, and, desirous of serving his own state, he resigned his seat in 
Congress, and returned to Virginia. He was soon after appointed a 
joint-commissioner vnth Dr. Fi'anklin and Silas Deane, for negotiating 
treaties with France, but circumstances caused him to decline the ac- 
ceptance of the proffered honor, and he continued in Virginia during 
the remaining period of the Revolution, actively engaged in the service 
of his state. He received a third election to Congress, but declined it, 
and was succeeded by Benjamin Harrison, the father of the late presi- 
dent. 

From the early part of 1777 to the middle of 1779, Mr, Jefferson was 
assiduously employed, conjointly with George Wythe and Edmund 
Pendleton, on a commission for revising the laws of Virginia. The 
duty was a most arduous one : and to Mr. Jefferson belongs the imper- 
ishable honor of being the first to propose, in the legislature of Virginia, 
the laws forbidding the importation of slaves ; converting estates tail* 
into fee simple ; annulling the rights of primogeniture ;t establishing 
schools for general education j and confirming the rights of freedom in 
religious opinion. 

Congress having resolved not to suffer the prisoners captured at Sar 
atoga, under Burgoyne, to leave the United States until the convention 
entered into by Gates and Burgoyne should be ratified by the British 
government, they were divided and sent to the different states, to be 
piovided for during the interval, A division of them was sent, early in 
1779, into the interior of Virginia, near the residence of Mr. Jefferson 

• A law entitled fee tail was adopted in the time of Edward I. of England, and at the time 
in question extended to all the English coloniea It restrained the alienation of lands and 
tenements by one to whom they had been given, with a limitation to a particular class of 
heirs, A fee-simple estate is one in which the owner has absolute power to dispose of it aa 
he pleases ; and if in his possession when he dies, it descends to hia heirs-general. 

t This right belonged to the eldest son, who succeeded to the estate of his ancestor, to the 
exclusion of his brothers and sisters. This is still the law in England, 



5» 



42 LIVES OF THE PRESIDENTS. 

Elected governor of Vii-ginia. — Attempt of the British to capture him. — Elected again to Congress. 

and his benevolent feelings were strongly exhibited by his sympathy for 
these enemies of his country. The prisoners were in great distress, and 
Mr. Jefferson and his friends did all in their power to alleviate their 
sufferings. An apprehended scarcity of provisions determined Gover- 
nor Patrick Henry to remove them to another part of the state, or out 
of it entirely. At this the officers and men were greatly distressed, and 
Mr. Jefferson wrote a touching appeal to the governor in their behalf, 
and they were allowed to remain.* 

In June, 1779, Mr. Jefferson succeeded Mr. Henry as governor of 
Virginia, and the close of his administration was a period of gi'eat diffi- 
culty and danger. His state became the theatre of predatory warfare, 
the infamous Arnold having entered it with British and tory troops, and 
commenced spreading desolation with fire and swoi'd along the James 
river. Richmond, the capital, was partly destroyed, and Jeffersdn and 
his council narrowly escaped capture. He tried, but in vain, to get 
possession of the person of Arnold, but the \vily traitor was too cautious 
for him. 

Very soon after his retirement to private life, Tarleton, who attempt- 
ed to capture the members of the legislature convened at Charlottesville, 
a short distance from Jefferson's residence, came very near taking him 
prisoner. Jefferson had sent his family away in his carriage, and re- 
mained to attend to some matters in his dwelling, when he saw the cav- 
alry ascending a hill toward his house. He mounted a fleet horse, 
dashed through the woods, and reached his family in safety. 

M. de Marbois, secretary of the French legation in the United States, 
having questioned Mr. Jefferson respecting the resources, &c., of his 
native state, he wrote in 1781 his celebrated work entitled " Notes on 
Virginia." The great amount of information which it contains, and the 
simple perspicuity of its style, made its author exceedingly popular in 
Europe as a writer and man of science, in addition to his character as 
a statesman. 

In 1782, he was appointed a minister plenipotentiary to assist others 
in negotiating a treaty of peace with Great Britain ; but infoi'mation of 
the preliminaries having been signed, reached Congi-ess befoi'e his de- 
parture, and he did not go. He was soon after elected a delegate to 
Congress, and was chairman of the committee, in 1783, to whom the 
treaty with Great Britain was referred. On their report, the treaty was 
unanimously ratified. 

• The officers and soldiers were very gratcfal to Mr. JefTerson, and when they were about 
to depart for England, the officers united in a letter of thanks to him. Mr. Jefferson, in reply, 
disclaimed the performance of any great service to them, and said : " Opposed as we happen 
to be in our sentiments of duty and honor, and anxious for contrary events, I shall, neverthe- 
less, sincerely rejoice in every circumstance of happiness and safety which may attend you 
personally." 



«; 



THOMAS JEFFERSON. 43 

Sent as minister to France. — Appointed secretary of state. — Elected president of the United States. 

In 1784, he wrote an essay on coinage and currency for the United 
States, and to him we are indebted for the convenient denominations 
of our federal cuiTency, the dollar as a unit, and the system of deci- 
mals. 

In May of this year, he was appointed, with Adams and Franklin, a 
minister to negotiate treaties of commerce with foreign nations. In 
company with his eldest daughter, he reached Paris in August. Dr. 
Franklin having obtained leave to return home, Mr. Jefferson was ap- 
pointed to succeed him as minister at the French court, and he re 
raained in France until October, 1789. While there, he became popu 
1-ar among the literati, and his society was courted by the leading writers 
of the day. 

During his absence the constitution had been formed, and under it 
Washington had been elected and inaugurated president of the United 
States. His visit home was under leave of absence, but Washington 
offered him a seat in his cabinet as secretary of state, and gave him his 
choice to remain in that capacity or return to France. He chose to 
remain, and he was one of the most efficient aids to the president during 
the stormy period of his first administration. He differed in opinion 
with Washington respecting the kindling revolution in France, but he 
agreed with him on the question of the neutrality of the United States. 
His bold avowal of democratic sentiments, and his expressed sympathies 
with the struggling populace of France in their aspirations for republi- 
canism, made him the leader of the democratic party here, opposed to 
the federal administration of Washington,* and in 1793 he resigned his 
seat in the cabinet. 

In 1796, he was the republican candidate for president, in opposition 
to John Adams. Mr. Adams succeeded, and Mr. Jefferson was elected 
vice-president.t In 1800, he was again nominated for president, and 
received a majority of votes over Mr. Adams. Aaron Burr was on the 
ticket with him, and received an equal number of votes ; but on the 
thirty-sixth balloting, two of Burr's friends vdthdrew, and Mr. Jefferson 
was elected, 

Mr. Jefferson was inaugurated at Washington on the 4th of March, 
1801, and chose his cabinet from among his political friends.| It was 

* In 1791, Washington asked his opinion respecting a national bank, a bill for which had 
been passed by Congress and approved by Washington. He gave his opinion in writing, and 
strongly objected to the measure, as being unconstitntional. 

t At that time, the candidate receiving the next highest number of votes to the one elected 
president, was vice-president. The constitution on that point has since been altered. During 
the time he was vice-president, he wrote a manual for the senate, which is stUl the standard 
of parliamentary rule in Congress and other bodies. 

t James Madison was chosen secretary of state ; Henry Dearborn, of Massachusetts, secre- 
tary of wai'; and Levi Lincoln, of Massachusetts, attorney-general. Mr. Adams's secretariea 
of the treasury and the navv were continued in oEEice a short time. Before the meeting of 



44 LIVES OF THE PRESIDENTS. 

Hifl policy respecting appointments to office. — Important acts of Congress. 

confidently expected by the federalists that he would cause a general re- 
moval from office of all opposed to his political views, but in this, to a 
great extent, they were disappointed. His appointments were from his 
own party ranks, but his removals were very few : and he announced 
his intention, as soon as the alleged abuses in this respect of the former 
administi-ation should be corrected, to make the test-questions for office, 
" Is he honest 1 Is he capable ? Is he faithful to the constitution ?" He 
was severely censured for his course in withholding some commissions 
issued by Mr. Adams, but he was sustained in his views by the supreme 
court. The film of party pi-ejudice was too impervious for his political 
opponents to perceive honest motives or correct actions in him ; and 
even now that film exists, and it is difficult to judge fairly of the ortho- 
doxy of his views on questions of national policy. It is left for the ex- 
perience of another generation to form a correct judgment. 

The seventh Congi-ess assembled in December, 1801, and the politi- 
cal parties were nearly equally divided, altht)ugh the democrats were in 
the majority in both houses. Instead of delivering his communication 
to Congress in person, as usual. Mi*. Jefferson transmitted a message in 
writing, which course has been ever since pursued as the most conve- 
nient and also most republican in its character. During the session, the 
law establishing circuit courts was repealed, and several judges appoint- 
ed by Mr. Adams were deprived of office. An act was also passed for 
apportioning representatives by the census of 1800, the ratio being one 
representative for thirty-three thousand inhabitants ; for fixing the mili- 
tary peace establishment, which provided for a military academy at 
"West Point, on the Hudson river ; for regulating trade with the Indian 
tribes ; for discontinuing duties on articles of domestic manufacture ; for 
establishing a uniform system of naturalization ;* for redeeming the 
public debt by an annual appropriation of seven millions and three hun- 
dred thousand dollars to the sinking-fund ; and for the formation of a por- 
tion of the northwest territory into a state. The state was admitted into 
the Union soon after, and called Ohio. Various suggestions of the presi- 
dent in relation to the curtailment of the public expenses were con- 
curred in. 

During the second session (1802-'3), very few important acts were 
oassed, except one concerning the prohibition of the importation of 
slaves under certain circumstances ; and another authorizing the execu- 
tive to call upon the several states for troops when necessary.f 

Congress in December, Albert Gallatin, of Pennsylvania, was appointed secretary of the 
treasury, and Robert Smith, of Maryland, secretary of the navy. 

• In 1798, a law was passed making the time of residence for an alien, before he could bo 
aaturalized, fourteen years. The act in question made it five years. 

t This act was passed in consequence of some apprehensions of war with Spain, growing 
oat of disputes concerning the soathwestem boundaty-line of the United States. Louisiana 



THOMAS JEFFERSON. 45 

Purchase of Louisiana. — Constitution amended. — Exploring expedition of Lewis and Clarke. 

Having received information of the cession of Louisiana to France, 
the president communicated vvdth Mr. Livingston, then minister to 
France, and instructed him to open negotiations for the purchase of the 
island of New Orleans and the Floridas.* Mr. Monroe was appointed 
in January, 1803, minister plenipotentiary to France, to act with Mr. 
Livingston, and an appropriation of two millions of dollars was made for 
the purpose of purchase. Napoleon, who was first consul, had appoint- 
ed the marquis de Marbois to confer with American ministers and the 
next day after Monroe's anival, the conference was opened. To the 
astonishment of the Americans, the French minister offered to cede all 
Louisiana, and upon this basis they proceeded. Messrs. LiAdngston and 
Monroe had no authority to enter into such extensive negotiations, but 
there was no time to be lost, for France and England were arminor 
against each other. A treaty was finally concluded," by which ^ a ni 30 
the United States agreed to pay fifteen millions of dollars for ^^°"^- 
the vast tenitory of Louisiana,! four millions of which France allowed 
to go toward the payment of indemnities for spoliations during peace. 
The treaty was equally satisfactory to both governments.^ It was rati- 
fied by Bonaparte on the 22d of May, 1S03, and by the United States 
on the 20lh of October following, a special session of Congress having 
been called for the purpose of .taking measures to put the treaty into 
execution. 

During the session of 1803-'4, an amendment to the constitution was 
proposed relative to the election of president and vice-president, so as 
to designate which person was voted for, for the respective offices. It 
was carried, and ratified by the state legislatures. 

In 1804,* an expedition for exploring the continent, from the 

•«»•••• • 1 T-v -fir- \ • ^ 1 • /.T 6 May 14. 

Mississippi to the Facitic (ior which, at the suggestion of the 
president, an appropriation had been made), left the " Father of "Wa- 
ters," under the direction of Captains Lewis and Clarke. They were 
absent two years, and were eminently successful. 

During this year another presidential election occurred. The repub- 
licans nominated Mr. Jefferson and George Clinton, of New York ; and 

was ceded to France by Spain in 1802, and the Spanish intendant at New Orleans declared 
Ihat the privilege given to the people of the United States, to make that city a place of deposita 
for merchandise, was ended. 

* The president erroneoasly supposed that the Floridas would also be ceded to Prance. 

t Its extent exceeded a million of square miles, and contained about eighty-five thousand 
inhabitants, int'.uding forty thousand slaves. 

X When the articles were signed, the negotiators cordially shook hands, and Mr. Livingston 
said : •' Prom this day, the United States take their place among the powers of the first rank j 
the English lose all exclusive influence in the affairs of America." And Napoleon afterwaid 
remarked to Marbois : " This accession of territory strengthens for ever the power of the United 
States ; and 1 have just given to England a maritime rival that will sooner or later humble 
her pride f 



46 LIVES OF THE PRESIDENTS. 

Re-e!ected president. — Non-iinportotion act. — Eun-'s alleged conspiracy. 



the federalists placed upon theh' ticket Charles Cotesworth Pinckney, 
of South Carolina, and Rufus King, of New York. The republican 
candidates received an overwhelming majority — one hundred and six- 
ty-two ao'ainst fourteen. Previous to the close of Mr. Jefferson's first 
administration, the war which had occurred with Tripoli was brought 
to a close. 

In 1S03, the president had recommended the construction of gun- 
boats for the protection of our harbors : and in 1S05, an appropriation 
of sixty thousand dollars enabled him to try the experiment of this 
chear) marine. But the system was very unpopular with the officers of 
the navy, and greatly opposed by the federalists. A large portion of 
the boats were driven ashore by a tempest; yet for three or four years 
they were kept in service. 

The ninth Congress assembled on the 2d of December, 1805. Diffi- 
culties with Spain still existing, it 'was proposed to give the president 
authority to call out troops for the defence of the southern frontier, as 
it was supposed that Spain would make aggressions from her Florida 
possessions. The proposition was Aot acceded to, and two millions of 
dollars were appropriated to purchase Florida. General John Arm 
stvon"-, of New York, and Mr. Bowdoin, of Massachusetts, v>^ere appoint 
eil commissioners to negotiate with Spain, at Paris. The negotiation 
proved unsuccessful. 

The interruptions to our commerce and the impressment of our sea- 
men by the British navy, caused Congress to pass an act against the 
importation of certain British manufactures ; and one hundred and fifty 
thousand dollars were appropriated for fortifying the ports and harbors 
of the United States. 

Durinf the year 1806, Colonel Burr's mj'sterious expedition ia the 
valley of the Mississippi caused great excitement in the public miod, it 
beino- believed by many that the object of his extensive militaiy ari-ange 
ments was to dissever the Union, and establish an independent govern 
ment west of the Alleganies. In 1807, he was arrested on charges hav 
in<T these suspicions for a basis ; and he was taken to Richmond, Vir- 
o-inia, where, in June, he was tried for high-treason before Chief-Justice 
Marshall. His trial lasted till August, when he was acquitted. The 
evidence seemed to show that his expedition was intended to be against 
the Spanish provinces of Mexico. 

In December, amicable negotiations having been entered into v/ith 
Great Britain, the non-importation act was suspended for one year. A 
treaty was concluded, but it was so unsatisfactory — nothing having been 
stipulated in it respecting impressments — that the president rejected it, 
the senate not then being in session. This act caused great excitement, 
especially in commercial circles. 



THOMAS JEFFERSON. 



47 



Effects of tlie Berlin and Milan decrees.— Jefferson retires from public life. 

Napoleon's Berlin (Zecree, of Noveml)er 21, 1806; the British orders 
tn council, November 11, 1807; and Napoleon's Milan decree, of De- 
cember 17, 1807 — all operated powerfully against American commerce, 
and nearly destroyed it, as all our vessels were liable to seizure, under 
these decrees and orders, if approaching the European coast. On the 
ISlh of December, the president recommended an embargo upon Amer- 
ican vessels, which recommendation was considered by Congress, and 
an act in accordance was passed.* This measure produced a great deal 
of dissatisfaction and commercial distress, but Congress fully sustained 
the president. 

During the excitement produced by the embargo, in 1808, another 
presidential election came on. James Madison, of Virginia, was nom- 
inated for president, and George Clinton for vice-president, by the re- 
publicans ; the federalists again nominated Pinckney and King. INIr. 
Madison was elected by a large majority — one hundred and twenty-two 
to forty-seven. 

So seriously oppressive became the embargo, that the leading feder- 
alists of the New-England states meditated a withdrawal of those states 
from the Union, unless the act was repealed. That fact, it is said, was 
disclosed to Mr. Jefferson by John Q,uincy Adams early in 1809. This 
new danger seemed paramount to all others ; and to preserve the Union 
intact, the embargo-act was so far repealed as to apply only to Great 
Britain and France. 

On the 3d of March, 1809, the administration of Mr. Jefferson closed, 

' and immediately after the inauguration of Mr. Madison he retired to 

Monticello. During his administration he had accomplished much for 

the future prosperity of the country ; but at the moment of his leaving 

the executive chair, events wore a gloomy aspect. 

Mr. Jefferson never again engaged in public life, but spent the re- 
maining seventeen years in the sweet retirement of Monticello, where, 
says Mr. "Webster, " he lived as became a wise man." He employed 
his time in philosophical pursuits and the management of his farm. 
Through his instrumentality, a university was foundedt at Charlottes- 
\alle, near Monticello, of which he was rector until his death, and a liberal 
patron as far as his means would allow.| 

• This act prohibited all American vessels from sailing for foreign ports ; all foreign ve.'jsels 
from taking out cargoes ; and all coasting-vessels were required to give bonds to land their 
cargoes in the United States. These restrictive measures were intended to so affect the com- 
merce of Great Britain, as to bring that government to a fair treaty of amity and commerce. 

i Called the University of Virginia. It was founded in 1818. 

t Toward the close of his life his pecuniary affairs became emban-assed, and he was obliged 
to sell his library, which Congress purchased for thirty thousand dollars. A short time previ 
ens to his death he received permission from the legislature of Virginia to dispose of his estate 
by lottery, to prevent its being sacrificed to pay his debts. He did not live to see it consum- 
mated. 



48 



LIVES OF THE PRESIDENTS. 



His death. — His person and character. 



In the spring of 1826, his bodily infirmities greatly increased, and in 
June he was confined wholly to his bed. About the fii'st of July he 
seemed free from disease, and his friends had hopes of his recovery ; but 
it was his own conviction that he should die, and he gave directions ac- 
cordingly. On the 3d, he inquired the day of the month. On being told, 
he expressed an ardent desire to live until the next day, to breathe tlie 
air of the fiftieth anniversary of his country's independence. His wish 
was granted : and on the morning of the 4th, aftier having expressed his 
gratitude to his friends and servants for their care, he said with a distinct 
voice, " I resign myself to my God, and my child to my country."* 
These were his last words, and about noon on that glorious day he ex- 
pired. It was a most remarkable coincidence that two of the committee 
(Mr. Adams and Mr, Jefferson) who drew up the Declaration of Inde- 
pendence ; who signed it; who successively held the office of chief ma- 
gistrate, should have died at nearly the same hour on the fiftieth anni- 
versary of that solemn act. 

Mr. Jefferson was a little over eighty-three years of age at the time 
of his death. In person, he was six feet two inches in height, erect, but 
quite thin. His complexion was fair, eyes light, and brilliant with in- 
telligence, and his hair, originally red, became silvery white in old age. 
His manner was simple but dignified, and his conversational powers 
wei-e of the rarest value. He was exceedingly kind and benevolent, an 
indulgent master to his servants, and liberal and friendly to his neigh- 
bors. He possessed remarkable equanimity of temper, and it is said he 
was never seen in a passion.t His friendship was lasting and ardent, 
and he was confiding and never distrustful. 

In religion, he was a freethinker ; in morals, pure and unspotted ; in 
politics, patriotic, honest, ardent, and benevolent. Respecting his po- 
litical character, there was (and still is) a great diversity of opinion, and 
we are not yet far enough removed from the theatre of his acts to judge 
of them dispassionately and justly. His life was devoted to his coun- 
try : the result of his acts, whatever it may be, is a legacy to mankind. 

* Mrs. Randolph, ■whom he tenderly loved. Just before he died, he handed her a morocco 
case, •with a request that she should not open it until after his decease. It contained a poet- 
ical tribute to her virtues, and an epitaph for his tomb, if any should be placed upon it. He 
wished his monument to be a small granite obelisk, with this inscription : — 

" Here was bm-ied 

Thomas Jefferson, 

Author of the Declaration of Independence, 

Of the Statute of Virginia for Religious Freedom, 

And Father of the University of Virginia." 

t During his presidency, Humboldt, the celebrated traveller, once visiting him, discovered 

in a newspaper upon his table a vile and slanderous attack upon his character. "Why do 

you not hang the man ?" asked Humboldt. " Put the paper in your pocket," said Jefferson, 

with a smile, " and, on your return to your country, if any one doubts the freedom of our press, 

■bow it to him, and tell him where you found it. 



JAMES MADISON, 

THE FOURTH PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES. 




,AMES MADISON, of Virginia, was the immediate suc- 
cessor of Ml'. Jefferson in the presidency. He was born 
at tl^e dwelling of his grandmother, opposite to Port 
Royal, on the Rappahannock river, in Orange county, 
Vii-ginia, on the 16th of March, 1751. His family were 
of Welsh origin, and were among the earlier and the 
most respected emigrants to Virginia. His rudimenlal education was 
received in a small grammar-school in his native town, and at the age of 
fourteen he was put under the cai-e of Mr. Robertson, a native of Scotland ; 
and subsequently of the Rev. Mr. Martin, of New Jersey, for the purpose 
of studying the classics and being fitted for college. At the age of sev- 
enteen years he entered Princeton college, of New Jersey, where he 
graduated with the usual honors in 1771. Under the superintendence 
of Dr. Witherspoon, the president, he remained at the college a year 
after he gi'aduated, and applied himself so intensely to study, as to 
impair his constitution, and he was feeble for years. 

After leaving college, he returned to Virginia, and commenced the 
practice of law ; but, his talents being appreciated, and the exigencies 
of the times calling for efficient aid fi'om whatsoever source it might be 
obtained, he was soon drawn into active public life. He was elected a 
member of the general assembly of Virginia in 1776, and in 1778 was 
appointed one of the executive council of that state. In 1779, he was 
chosen a delegate to the Continental Congress, and was an active mem- 
ber of that body until 1784. 

In 1786," the Virginia legislature appointed him a commis- 
Bioner to meet with those of other states at Annapolis, to amend 
the Articles of Confederation, and to devise a uniform commercial sys- 
tem. The convention was attended by very few representatives, but 
they recommended the calling of another convention at Philadelphia, the 



52 LIVES OF THE PRESIDENTS. 

His labors for a new constitution. — Is elected a member of Congress. — His activity and wisdo m. 

year following, to which Mr. Madison was elected. The convention as- 
sembled in May, and Mr. Madison was among the leading debaters 
He labored assiduously in the formation of a constitution for the gov- 
ernment of the country that should be acceptable ; and the one that wag 
finally adopted bears the strong and frequent impress of his mind and 
pen.* His views wave coincident wdth those of Washington and others 
who were favorable co a strong federal government j and after the adop- 

^a.c X. ^^^^ ^^ ^^^ constitution," he wielded the pen effectively in the 
^■^^^^ numbers of the " Federalist," in connexion with Jay, Hamil- 
ton, and others, in its defence. He took copious notes of all the pro- 
ceedings of the convention, which, with those of his other valuable pro- 
ductions, have been published since his death, under the title of " The 
Madison Papers." 

Mr. Madison was elected a member of the Virginia convention to 
whom the new constitution was submitted for consideration,t and he 
there met in opposition some of the boldest thinkers of his native state, 
including Patrick Henry, James Monroe, William Grayson, George 
Mason (an intimate friend of Washington), and others ; but he had the 
gi-atification of seeing the question finally can-ied in favor of adoption by 
a vote of eighty-nine to seventy-nine. 

The majority of the members of the Virginia legislature being anti- 
federalists, or opposed to the constitution, Mr. Madison was an unsuc- 
cessful candidate for a seat in the senate of the United States. He was, 
however, elected a representative for a congi'essional district, and took 
his seat at New York, in 1789. He was an active member of that body 

• In a letter to Washington, written just previously to the assembling of the convention, 
Mr. Madison gave an outline of his views on the subject, of which the following is a brief 
synopsis of the main points : The maintenance of the individual sovereignty of the states, all 
amenable to the general control of a federal government ; a change in the principle of repre- 
eentation ; the general government to have absolute control in the regulation of trade, laying 
imposts, fixing terms of naturalization, coining money, &c., &c. ; the federal government to 
possess a veto-power in all cases whatsoever on the legislative acts of the states ; to have gen- 
eral powers over the judiciary, causing the oaths of judges to include a promise of fidelity to 
the general government ; the admiralty jurisdictions to fall entirely within the purview of the 
national government ; the establishment of a «atioual tribunal for appeals in all cases, to which 
foreigners or inhabitants of other states may be parties \ the officers in the execntive depart- 
ments to be appointed by Congress ; the militia to be placed under the authority of the general 
government ; the national legislature to be divided into two branches, one of them to be chosen 
at short intervals by the people at large or by the legislatures of the states, the other to con- 
sist of fewer members, to be chosen for a longer term, and to possess the exercise of the veto- 
power before alluded to ; the appointment of a further check— a council of revision — inclu- 
ding all the great ministerial offlters; the provision of a national execntive ; provision made for 
guarantying the tranquillity of the states against internal and external dangers ; and the ratifica- 
tion of the proposed constitution by the collective voice of the people, and not by legislative 
action in the respective states. 

These views were remarkably sonnd, if his theory of a strong government was a correal 
one ; and they formed to a great extent the basis of the constitution adopted by the convention. 

t Ck)nventions for this purpose were called in all the statea. 



JAMES MADISON. 53 



His marriage. — Appointed secretary of state. — Elected president of the United States. 

during the whole of Washington's administration. Upon the subject of 
the funding system, a national bank, and other leading measures, origi 
nating with Hamilton, he was found in opposition to his federal friends, 
and generally sustained the views of Mr. "Jefferson, then secretary of 
state. In 1794, he introduced a series of resolutions, based upon Jef- 
ferson's recommendations, concerning the commercial policy of the gov- 
ernment, which, being considered favorable to France and offensive to 
Great Britain, awakened a warm debate. During that year, he was 
married to Mrs. Dolly Paine Todd,* a young widow, twenty-three years 
of age, whose first husband died in less than three years after mai'riage. 
This mamage proved highly beneficial to Mr. Madison, for the strong 
mind and pleasing manners of his wife were essential aids to him while 
he was the chief magistrate of the nation. 

Mr. Madison continued to act with the republican or democratic party, 
and in the Vii'ginia assembly (to which he was elected, having resigned 
his seat in Congress), in 1797, he made a report against the " alien and 
sedition laws" of Mr. Adams, which report, it is said, has ever since 
been the text for the doctrine of state-rights in that state. 

When, in 1801, Mr. Jefferson was elected president, he appointed 
Mr. Madison secretary of state, which office he held during Mr. Jeffer- 
son's administration of eight years' duration. He became the demo- 
cratic candidate for president in 1808, and was successful. Mr. Madi- 
son was inaugurated on the 4th of March, 1809. He retained a portion 
of Mr. Jefferson's cabinet.t At the opening of the eleventh Congress 
m May, there was a majority of democrats. During that session, the 
British minister at Washington (Mr. Erskine) made overtures for the 
repeal of the non-intercourse law, promising the reversal of the British 
orders in council. But his government refused to sanction his act, and 
the non-intercourse law was revived in full force. The people were 
greatly excited, and would readily have sanctioned a declaration of war 
with England. 

In the early part of 1810, Napoleon issued the decree of Ramhouillet,X 
which was avowedly issued as a retaliation of the non-intercourse act of 
the United States, and French orivateers constantly depredated upon 

• She was the daughter of a Philadelphia quaker named Paine, who removed from that city 
to Virginia. She was well educated, and was remarkable for her fine person, polished man- 
ners, and distinguished talents in conversation. She still survives her honored husband (1849), 
and resides chiefly at Washington city where her society is courted by the distinguished vis 
iters to the national metropolis. 

t He appointed Robert Smith, of Maryland, secretary of state ; William Eustis, of Massa- 
chusetts, secretary of war; Paul Hamilton, of South Carolina, secretary of the nav^ and Al- 
bert Gallatin was continued secretary of the treasury, and Caesar A. Rodney, of Delaware, 
attoroey-general. 

X It decreed that all United States vessels which had entered French ports since the 80th 
of March, 1808, should be declared forfeit, and sold for the benefit of the French tteasuiy. 



54 LIVES OF THE PRESIDENTS 



Expiration of the charter of the United States bank. — His aversion to war. — Re-elected president 

our commerce. In May, Congress passed a new non-intercourse act, 
declaring that when either the British or French government should 
repeal its orders or decrees, and the other did not, the United States 
would repeal the act so far as it applied to the government so repealing. 
France reciprocated the movement, but the British cabinet would not,* 
and American vessels continued to be seized and sold, and American 
seamen pressed into the British service. 

During the session of 1811, the people of Louisiana were* authorized 
to form a state constitution, preparatory to being admitted into the 
Union. Also the charter of the United States bank, incoi-porated in 
1791, expired, and a bill providing for its renewal was lost by the cast- 
ing vote of the vice-president (George Clinton) in the senate. The gen- 
eral policy of Mr. Madison was fully sustained by Congi-ess and the 

oNov. people; and at the meeting of the twelfth Congress," Henry 
is^^i- Clay, an ardent supporter of the administration, was elected 
speaker of the house of representatives. t 

After years of ineffectual negotiation with both England and France 
respecting their orders and decrees, the president waived his decided op- 
position to war measures, and, by the advice of Mr. Clay and other 
leading friends, he recommended strong measm-es toward Great Britain. 
Bills were accordingly passed for augmenting the army and navy, and 
for giving the president extraordinai'y powers. 

The time now approached for another presidential election. The 
leading I'epublicans of New York, who were dissatisfied vsdth Mr. Mad- 
ison because they thought his measures too mild in regard to foreign 
policy, and were anxious for an immediate declaration of war against 
Great Britain, contemplated nominating for the presidency De Witt 
Clinton, then lieutenant-governor of the state, and mayor of the city of 
New York. But the change in Mr. Madison's policy, and his expressed 
determination to prosecute a war with vigor if commenced, reconciled 
his more belligerent friends, and he was re-elected. He was inaugu- 
rated on the 4th of March, 1812.1 

Toward the close of February, 1812, the president received a com- 
munication from a person named John Henry, who declared himself a 
secret agent of the British government, employed to treat with the dis- 
affected federalists of New England on the subject of a separation from 

• England urged that France had given no positive evidence of a repeal of her decrees. In 
fact, they were not repealed : and in March, 1811, Napoleon declared that those decrees were 
the " fundamental laws of the empire." 

t Mr. Clay had been a member of the senate for two short sessions. John C. Calhoun, of 
South Carolina, and William H.- Crawford, of Georgia, were members of the house at thia 
time, andTnl were the warm friends of the president. 

X The only change in his cabinet was the appointment of Colonel James Monroe secretary 
of state, and William Pinckney attorney-general. Mr. Monroe waa the only member of bia 
cabinet possessed of military taste and skilL 



JAMES MADISON. 55 



Declaration of war. — Leading events of the war. 



the Union, &e.* So well established appeared the truth of his allega- 
tions, and so valuable were his services considered, that he was paid 
fifty thousand dollars from the secx-et-service fund. It was generally 
believed that his disclosures prevented the dismemberment, perhaps the 
destmction, of the whole Union. 

It being determined to declare war against Great Britain, an act wa3 
passed in 1812," laying an embargo upon vessels of the United 
States for ninety days. On the 8th of April, Louisiana was 
admitted into the Union ; and on the 4th of June, the Missouri territoiy 
was organized. On the 3d, a majority of the committee on foreign re- 
lations of the house of representatives reported in favor of a declaration 
of war.t The measure was adopted in the house of representatives by 
a vote of seventy-nine to forty-nine, and in the senate by a vote of nine- 
teen to thirteen. On the 18th of June,| the act was approved by the 
president, and he issued his proclamation accordingly. Our space will 
permit us only to give a brief chronological record of the leading events 
during the war. 

1812: June. — British orders in council ve-pealed. August. — sun-en- 
der of General Hull. Action between the frigates Constitution and 
Guerriere. November.— :- Defeat at Queenstown. Action between the 
Frolic and Wasp. Action between the United States and Macedonian. 

1813: April. — Captm-e of York (now Toronto), Upper Canada. 
May. — Battle of Fort George. June. — Chesapeake captured by the 
Shannon. September. — Penny's victory on Lake Erie. October. — Bat- 
tle of the Thames, and death of Tecumseh. December. — Buffalo burnt. 

1814: March. — Action between the frigates Essex and Phoebe. Ju- 
ly. — Battle of Chippewa. Battle of Bridgewater. August. — Wash- 
ington city captured, and the capitol burnl.|| Stonington bombarded. 
M'Donough's victory on Lake Champlain. September, — Battle of 
North Point, near Baltimore. December. — Treaty of Ghent signed.§ 
Meeting of the Hartford convention.^ 

• The British minister at Washington solemnly disavowed all knowledge of the matter 

t The majority consisted of John C. Calhoun, Felix Grundy, John Smilie, John A. Harper 
Joseph Desha, and Ebenezer Seaver. 

t A party immediately sprang into existence called the " peace party," which cast *eTery 
possible obstacle in the way of the administration. Although composed cmefly of federalists, 
it was discountenanced by many leading members of that party, 

II General Ross, with five thousand men, marched against Washington city, which was fee- 
bly defended by a few regular troops and militia. The president and his cabinet narrowly 
escaped capture by flight. It is said that the preservation of the " Declaration of Indepen. 
dence" and other valuable papers was owing to the courage of Mrs. Madison, who carried 
them away with her own hands. 

$ The meeting of the American and British commissioners to negotiate for peace took place 
at Ghent in Flanders, in August, 1814. The treaty was concluded and signed on the 24th of 
December. It was ratified by the president, February 17, 1815. 

H Delegations from the several New-England states assembled at Hartford for the purpose 



66 



LIVES OF THE PRESIDENTS. 



War with Algiers. — Incorporation of United States bank. — Madison's retirement and death. 

1815 : January. — Battle of New Orleans. February. — Capture of 
the President Capture of the Cyane and Levant These were tho 
principal occurrences during the war.* 

The war with England had scarcely closed, when the depredations 
upon our commerce^by the Algerine cbrsairs rendered it necessary to 
declare war against that power. A squadron under Commodore De- 
catur sailed for the Mediterranean in May, 1815, and in a very short 
time he obtained payment for property destroyed, and treaties highly 
advantageous to the United States from the dey of Algiers and the beys 
of Tunis and Tripoli. 

In 1816, another national bank was incoi-porated, with a capital of 
thirty-five millions of dollars, and a charter to continue in force twenty 
years. In December, Indiana was admitted into the Union aa an inde- 
pendent state. During the autumn, James Monroe, of Virginia, was 
elected president, and Daniel D. Tompkins, of New York, vice-presi- 
dent ; and on the 3d of March, 1817, the second and last administration 
of Mr. Madison closed. He had seen his countiy pass honorably through 
the trying scenes of a war, and he resigned his office into the hands of 
his friend and successor amid the blessings of general peace and pros- 
perity. He retired to his seat at Montpelier, in Orange county, Vir- 
ginia, where he passed the remainder of his days in the peaceful pur- 
suits of agriculture.t On the 28th of June, 1836, he closed his mortal 
career, at the ripe old age of eighty-five years. 

Mr. Madison was of small stature, and a little disposed to corpulency. 
The top of his head was bald, and he usually had his hair powdered. 
He generally dressed in black. His manners were modest and retiring, 
and in conversation he was pleasing and instructive. ^As a polished 
writer he had few equals ; and the part he bore in framing the consti- 
tution,! and its subsequent support, obtained for him the title of " Father 
of the Constitution." 



of devising measures for terminating the war, to which a large majority of the people of those 
Btates were opposed. That conrentioa has been denounced as treasonable to the general 
government 

• The total expenditures of the United States government during the war may be stated in 
round numbers at one hundred millions of dollars, and the loss of lives at thirty thousand 
persons. • 

t He was chosen, in 1829, a member of the "Virginia convention to revise the state constitu- 
tion, and for many years he was rector of the university established through the influence of 
Mr. Jefferson. 

t He was the last surriring ngner of that instrument. 



JAMES MONROE, 

THE FIFTH PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES. 




AMES MONROE, the fifth president of the United States, 
was born on the 2d of April, 1759, in the county of West- 
moreland, Virginia ; and it is a singular fact that the coast 
section of that state produced four of the first five presi- 
dents. His father, Spence Monroe, and his mother, Eliz- 
abeth Jones, were both descended from one of the earliest 
and most respectable families of that state. James was only six years 
old when the stamp-act was passed, and consequently his early youth was 
spent amid the excitements which intervened between that oppressive 
measure and the kindling of the Revolution. He thus imbibed a patri- 
otic and military spirit from the stirring scenes around him ; and when, 
at the .age of eighteen years, he left William and Mary college, fired 
with the zeal which the Declaration of Independence inspired, he has- 
tened to Washington's headquarters in New York," and joined ^ xwrust, 
the continental army. He was present at the disastrous ■^^'^^• 
skirmish at Harlem, on York island, and at the equally disastrous 
battle of White Plains. He was also found in the vanguard at Tren- 
ton, and there received a bullet-wound which scarred him for life. 
For his gallant sei"vice there he was promoted to the rank of captain 
of infantry. In the campaigns of 1777 and 1778, he acted as aid to 
Lord Stirling, and was distinguished for his valor in the battles of Bran- 
dywine, Germantown, and Monmouth. While a staff-officer, he was 
out of the line of promotion ; and being desirous of rising in the scale 
of honor, he made an attempt to raise a regiment of Virginia troops. 
He had the sanction of Washington, but the exhausted state of the 
country rendered his efforts ineffectual. He then turned his attention 
from militaiy pursuits, and commenced the study of law under Mr. Jef- 
ferson. When dangers threatened, and actual invasion alarmed his 



60 LIVES OF THE PRESIDENTS. 

Elected to Congress. — His course in relation to the constitution. — Elected governor of Virginia. 

State, he was found among the volunteers ; and when, in 1780, Charles- 
ton fell into the hands of the British, he repaired to the southern army 
as a commissioner appointed by the governor of Virginia, to collect in- 
formation for Congress and the commander-in-chief, respecting its 
sti-ength, and its ability to rescue and defend that portion of the Union. 
In 1782, he was elected a member of the Virginia legislature, and 
was soon after chosen by that body a member of the executive«council. 
The following year, although only twenty-five years of age, he was cho- 
sen a delegate to represent Virginia in the Continental Congress. He 
was present when Washington surrendered his commission to that body; 
and he continued to represent his state there until 1786,* In 1785, he 
took the incipient step in Congress toward the framing of a new consti- 
tution, by moving to invest Congress with the power of regulating trade 
and of levying an import-duty. These movements finally brought about 
the convention to revise the Articles of Confederation. 

According to a rule of the old Continental Congress, a member of that 
body was ineligible for a second teim; and when, in 1786, Mr. Mon- 
roe's term expired, he retired to Fredericksburg, with a view of prac- 
tising law. But he was soon after elected a member of the Virginia 
legislature ; and in 1788, he was chosen a delegate to the state conven- 
tion to decide upon the adoption of the constitution. Not being satis- 
fied with that instrument, although conscious of the inefficiency of the 
Aiticles of Confederation, he opposed its adoption. In 1789, he was 
elected to a seat in the senate of the United States, in which station he 
continued until 1794, always acting Vidth the anti-federalists, and opposed 
to Washington's administration. 

In 1794, he was appointed to succeed Gouvemeur Moms as minister 
to France, but not confox'ming to Washington's views, he was recalled 
in 1796, t In 1799, he was elected governor of Virginia, and served the 
constitutional term of three years. In 1803, Mr, Jefferson appointed 
him envoy extraordinary to France, to act with Mr. Livingston, and he 
was a party to the treaty for the cession and purchase of Louisiana, Dis- 
putes concerning boundaries having occuiTed with Spain, he went to 
Madrid to settle the difficulty, but he was unsuccessful-! In 1807, he 
and Mr, Pinckney negotiated a treaty with Great Britain, but it proved 
unsatisfactory, and was never ratified ; and during the year he returned 
to the United States. 

• During his attendance at New York as a member of Congress, he became acquainted with 
and married the daughter of Mr. L. Kortright, celebrated in the fashionable circles of London 
and Paris for her beauty and accomplishments. She was a most estimable woman, in both 
public and private life. 

t On his return, he published a vindication of bis course while in France, in which he cen- 
sured the conduct of the administration toward that republic, 

t Mr, Pinckney was then minister to Spain, but their Joint eSbrts proved ineScctuoL 



JAMES MONROE. 61 



Elected president of the United States. — The Seminole war. 



In 1811, Mr. Monroe was again elected governor of Virginia, but was 
soon after appointed by Mr. Madison secretary of state, which oiEce he 
held during Madison's administration. After the capture of Washing- 
ton, he took charge of the war department (still remaining secretary of 
state), and in that position he exhibited great energy. 

Mr. Monroe was elected president of the United States in 1816, and 
was inaugurated on the 4th of March, 1817.* Impi'essed with the ne- 
cessity of frontier defences, he started in May on a tour of inspection — 
extending eastward as far as Portland, in Maine, northward to the St. 
Lawrence, and westwai'd to Deti-oit. He was absent about six months, 
and was eveiywhere greeted with distinguished honors. 

The first session of the fifteenth Congress commenced on the 1st of 
December, 1817, when Mr. Clay was re-elected speaker of the house of 
representatives. The democratic majority in both houses was so over- 
whelming, that the old federal party seemed hardly to have an existence ; 
in fact, it was scarcely known as such after the peace of 1815. In De- 
cember, the Mississippi territory was divided : the western portion was 
admitted into the Union as the state of Mississippi, and the eastern was 
erected into a territorial government and called Alabama.t 

About the close of 1817, the depredations in Georgia and Alabama, 
of the Seminole Indians, called for hostile measures, and General Gaines 
was sent to reduce them to submission. He was soon after reinforced 
by General Jackson| with a considerable number of troops, and the In- 
dians were readily subdued. 

The state of Illinois was admitted into the Union on the 3d of Decem- 
ber, 1818. In February, 1819, a treaty was negotiated, by which Spain 
ceded to the United States the whole of East and West Florida and the 
adjacent islands. Early in the year, the territory of Arkansas was erect- 
ed out of a portion of Missouri ; and the people of Michigan were au- 
thorized to send a delegate to Congress. On the 4th of December, 1819, 
Alabama was admitted into the Union. Early in May, 1820, Maine was 
separated from Massachusetts and made an independent state. 

• Daniel D. Tompkins, of New York, was elected vice-president. John Quincy Adams, of 
Massachusetts, was appointed secretary of state ; William H. Crawford, of Georgia, secretary 
of the treasury ; John C. Calhoun, of South Carolina, secretary of war; and William Wirt, of 
Virginia, attorney-general. W. W. Crowninshield, of Massachusetts, was continued secreta- 
ry of the navy until November, 1818, when Smith Thompson, of New York, was appointed in 
his place. General Jackson, who was a warm friend of Monroe, advised him to disregard 
party influence in his appointments, and choose the best men in the country. But he selected 
chiefly from among his political friends. 

t Congress passed an act about the dose of 1817, fixing the number of stripes, alternate red 
and white (first adopted in 1777), at thirteen, and directed that the Union be represented by 
stars equal to the number of states — white on a blue field. 

t General Jackson marched into the Spanish territory of Florida, and seized St. Marks and 
Pensacola- This act gave rise to much discussion in Congress, and diplomacy between tho 
two governments. 



62 LIVES OF THE PRESIDENTS. 

Re-elected president. — His death and character. 

In 1820, Mr. Monroe was re-elected president with great unanimity 
Notwithstanding general prosperity prevailed (and immigration was 
fast peopling new states and adding them to the Union), the currency 
became much deranged, and private banking-companies flooded the 
country with paper money. In August, 1821, Missouri, the twenty' 
fourth state, was admitted into the Union.* In January, 1822, our gov- 
ernment acknowledged the independence of Mexico and five Spanisn 
provinces of South America ; and money sufficient to defi-ay the ex- 
penses of envoys to each was appropriated. During the year a treaty 
concerning navigation and commerce was made with France. An 
alarming system of piracy having grown up in the West Indies, a naval 
force was sent there under the command of Commodore Porter, and 
upward of twenty piratical vessels were destroyed on the coast of Cu- 
ba," and their retreats were broken up. Durinsc the sum- 
mer of 1824, La Fayette visited this country as the " guest 
of the nation," and made a tour of nearly five thousand miles. 

The election of Mr. Monroe's successor was an exciting topic for 
nearly three years. There were five candiflates in the field, all of the 
democratic party : John Q.uincy Adams, Henry Clay, William H. Craw- 
ford, John C. Calhoun, and Andrew Jackson. The choice devolved 
upon the house of representatives, and John Quincy Adams was the 
successful one. 

On the 3d of March, 1825, Mr. Monroe retired from the presidential 
chair, his administration having been an eminently harmonious and 
prosperous one.t He retired to his residence in Loudon county, in Vir- 
ginia, where he resided until 1831, when he removed to the city of New 
York and took up his residence with his son-in-law, Samuel L. Gouver 
neur. He was soon after seized with severe illness ; and on the 4th of 
July, 1831, he expired, in the seventy-second year of his age, making 
the third president who had died on the national anniversary. 

Mr. Monroe was about six feet high and well formed, with light com- 
plexion and blue eyes. Honesty, firmness, and prudence, rather than 
superior intellect, were stamped upon his countenance. He was indus- 
trious and indefatigable m labor, warm in his friendships, and in man- 
ners was a good specimen of the old Virginia gentleman. His long 
life was honorable to himself and useful to his country. 

• On the subject of the admission of this slate, Congress, and indeed the whole country, was 
greatly agitated by the question whether slavery should be allowed to exist in the new stata 
The north and south were for the first time arrayed against each other. The matter waa 
finally compromised. 

t During his administration, bo rapid bad been the tide of immigration, that six new Btatei 
were added to the UniosL 



JOHN QUIJSCY ADAMS, 

THE SIXTH PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES. 




N the 11th day of July, 1767, the subject of our sketch 
was bora at the family mansion of his father, John 
Adams, in Quincy, Massachusetts, and chiistened by 
the name of John Quincy, after his gi-eat-grandfa- 
ther, who was a distinguished citizen of the province 
about the commencement of the eighteenth century. 
At the age of eleven yeai'S," he accompanied his father to 
France,* and received the daily caresses and instructions of 
Doctor Franklin and other distinguished men there. Thus he in a 
measure entered public life in early childhood. In I'ySO, he again ac- 
companied his father to France. He went to school a short time in 
Paris ; and on the removal of his father to Holland, he was sent, first to 
the public school in Amsterdam, and afterward to the city university of 
Leyden. In 17S1, then only fourteen years of age, he accompanied Mr. 
Francis Dana to Russia. Mr. Dana had been appointed embassador to 
that court, and young Adams went as his private secretary. In the win- 
ter of 1782-'3, he travelled alone through Sweden and Denmark, thence 
to Hamburg and Bremen, and reached the Hague in safety, where his 
father was then minister for the United States. When, in 1785, his fa- 
ther was appointed a minister to England, he asked leave to return home 
and complete his education, for hitherto his book-studies had been con- 
stantly inten'upted. He entered Hai'vard university, where he gradu- 
ated in July, 1787. 

At the age of twenty he commenced the study of law with Theoi)hilu3 
Parsons, of Newburypoit;t and after completing his course of study, ho 

* John Adams was a joint-commissioner with Franklin and Lee to negotiate a treaty of 
commerce, &c. 

t Wbile a student in liis office, Parsons was chosen to address Washington on the occasion 
of his visit there. He asked each of his students to write an address. That of Adama was 
chosen and delivered by Parsons. 



_ _^=^ 

66 LIVES OF THE PRESIDENTS. 

tDs essays on "Neutrality." — His various public services. — Is elected president of the United States. 

removed to Boston and commenced practice, employing his leisure in 
willing upon political subjects. His essays, showing it to be the duty 
of the United States to remain neutral in regard to the existing quarrel 
between France and England, were read with admiration, and they ef- 
fectually aided in resisting the efforts of Genet to involve the United 
States in the controversy. They gave him a reputation as a writer and 
statesman, and his talents were appreciated by Washington.* In May> 
1794, he was appointed resident minister to the Netherlands. Toward 
the close of his administration, Washington appointed him minister to 
Portugal : but while on his way to Lisbon, he received a new commis- 
sion from his father (then president), which changed his destination to 
Berlin,t where he effected a commercial treaty with Prussia. In May, 
1797, he was married tc^ Louisa Catharine, daughter of Joshua Johnson, 
of Maryland, at that time residing in London. 

He returned to America in 1801, and in 1802 he was elected to the 
senate of Massachusetts. In 1803, he was elected to a seat in the Uni- 
ted States senate, where he uniformly supported the measures of Mr. 
Jefferson. For this support the Massachusetts legislature censured him, 
and in 1806 he resigned his seat. 

In 1809, Mr. Madison appointed him minister plenipoteiitiary to the 
court of the emperor of Russia, and he was the first who occupied that 
station. The emperor Alexander admitted him to a degree of intimacy 
quite extraordinary ; and when war between the United States and 
Great Britain was declared in 1812, he offered his mediation, but it was 
rejected by the latter government. In 1814, Mr. Adams was placed at 
the head of the American commission that met the English commission- 
ers at Ghent, to negotiate for peace. In connexion wdth Clay and Gal- 
latin, he negotiated a treaty of commerce with Great Biitain, on the 
basis of which our present commercial relations with that country are 
founded. 

In 1815, Mr. Adams was appointed minister to the court of St. James, 
which post he occupied until 1817, when President Monroe offei-ed him 
a seat in his cabinet as secretary of state. He accepted the office, and 
he remained therein during the eight years' administration of Mr. Mon- 
roe. His indefatigable industry, and clear, statesmanlike views, ren- 
dered him one of the most useful men in the country. 

In 1S24, Mr. Adams was one of five candidates for president of the 
United States. In consequence of this number, by which the votes in 
the electoral college were divided, that body could not make a choice, 
and it was referred to the house of representatives. Mr. Adams was 

• Mr. Jefferson, who formed an acquaintance with him in Paris, recommended Washington 
to introduce him into tlie public service. 
t This change was made by the advice and approval of Washington. 



JOHN QUINCY ADAMS. 67 



Growth of opposition. — Trouble in Georgia. — Indian treaties. — Tariff-bill. — Presidential election. 

chosen, and on the 4th of March, 1825, he was inaugurated. The 
senate being in session, he at once nominated his cabinet, which nonn- 
inationa were confirmed.* 

Mr. Adams's administration was one of almost unbroken peace and 
prosperity — peace with foreign nations, and tranquilHty and prosperity 
at home. Such being the case, there are but a few prominent events in 
his administration requiring especial notice, and these chiefly relate to 
our domestic affairs. Unlike his predecessor, Mr. Monroe, Mr. Adams 
found a powerful opposition to his administration rapidly growing up, 
and at the close of his term, the party lines were very distinctly drawn. 

In 1825, some difficulty arose between the general government and 
the state of Georgia, respecting the extinguishment of the Indian titles in 
that state,t but it was soon amicably settled. In August, a treaty was 
concluded with the northwest tribes, and a general peace with the sav- 
ages ensued. In September, La Fayette departed for France in the frig- 
ate Brandywine.f When he left "Washington, Mr. Adams pronounced 
an eloquent parting address in the presence of a vast concourse of people. 

The first session of the nineteenth Congress passed but few acts of gen- 
eral public interest ; and when the second session opened, hostility to the 
administration was so strongly manifested, that it was evident that meas- 
ures, even of acknowledged public utility, would, if proposed by the 
president or his friends, meet with much opposition. Mr. Calhoun, the 
vice-president, was alienated from Mr. Adams ; and the opposition, daily 
accumulating strength, assumed the decided lineaments of a distinct par- 
ty before the close of the session in 1827. As early as October, 1825, 
the legislature of Tennessee nominated General Jackson as a candidate 
for the presidency, which nomination was accepted by him, and he re- 
signed his seat in the senate of that state. 

A general tariff-bill was passed on the 19th of April, 1828, in accord- 
ance with numerous petitions and memorials from northern manufactur- 
ers and others. It was very unpopular in the southern states, and at- 
tempts were made for its revision, but it remained in force until 1832, 
when it was changed by the compromise-bill offered by Mr. Clay. 

The presidential election took place in the autumn of 1828. Public 
feeling was highly excited, and all the bitterness of party rancor which 
distinguished the two parties at the time of Mr. Jefferson's election was 
exhibited. The candidates were General Jackson and Mr. Adams; the 

• He appointed Henry Clay, of KentVicky, secretary of'state ; Richard Rush, of Pennsylva- 
nia, secretary of the treasury ; James Barbour, of Virginia, secretaiy of war , and Mr. Wirt 
was continued attorney-general. 

t A few Creek chiefs, in violation of a law of their nation, negotiated with the United Statea 
for a cession of all their lands in Georgia and Alabama. The matter was finally settled to the 
eatisfaction of both Georgia and the Indians, by the latter retaining their lands in Alabama. 

t This was a new frigate, and was named Brandy wine in honor of La Fayette, who was 
distinguished for bis valot in the battle at the river of that name, during our Revolalioa. 



68 LIVES OF THE PRESIDENTS. 

His retirement from office. — Elected a member of the house of representatives. — His character. 

result was the election of the former by a vote in the electoral college of 
one hundred and seventy-one to eighty-eight. On the 3d of March, 

1829, Mr. Adams left the presidential chair and retired to private life, 
beloved by his political friends, and highly respected by his opponents. 

The most prominent features in Mr. Adams's administration were 
tnose pertaining to the domestic policy of the government, and time 
alone can determine how far that policy was based upon sound wisdom. 
That much was done for the true honor, glory, and prosperity of the 
country, none can deny. Duiing his administration, internal improve- 
ments had been fostered with a liberal hand, nearly fourteen millions of 
dollars having been expended for these and other beneficial objects ; 
more than five millions of dollars were appropriated to the surviving 
officers of the Revolution ; and at the same time the interest on the pub- 
lic debt was punctually paid, and the principal was reduced more than 
thirty millions of dollars. When Mr. Adams left the executive chair, 
the United States were at peace with all the world. 

But he was not long permitted to enjoy the repose of private life. In 

1830, he was elected to represent in Congress the district in which he 
resided, and in December, 1831, he took his seat in the house of repre- 
Bentatives. He was then in the sixty-fifth year of his age. 

From that time, until the day of his death, he conthmed a member 
of the house, and one of its most active and indefatigable laborers. 
His fervid eloquence on all occasions where his feelings were wanxily 
enlisted, obtained for him the appellation of " the old man eloquent." 
His feelings and his exertions were ever enlisted on the side of popu- 
lar freedom and human rights ; and in the national legislature he was one 
of the stoutest champions of the right of petition in its broadest sense. 

The editor of the Statesman's Manual (who wrote in 1846) concludes 
his biography with the following prophetic sentence: "The subject of 
this memoir is now in his seventy-ninth year, and, ' although his eye is 
dim, and his natural force somewhat abated,' he is still found at his 
post in the public service, where, like the earl of Chatham, it may he 
expected his mortal career will finally close." 

That prophetic thought is now an historical fact. He was prostrated 
by paralysis, while in his seat in the house of representatives, on the 
twenty-second day of February 1848; and he yielded up his spirit to the 
God who gave it on the twenty-third. He died in the speaker's room in 
the capitol. His last wor(is were, " This is the end of earth." Ho 
would have been eighty-one years old on the eleventh day of July 1848. 

Mr. Adams was of middle stature and rather full person, and his 
dark, penetrating eyes beamed with intelligence. Old age bowed 
his head, but when seated at his desk, in Congress, nothing but his 
thin gray hair indicated his physical decadence. 



f- 



ANDREW JACKSON, 



THE SEVENTH PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES. 




HE family of Andrew Jackson were of Scottish ori- 
gin, his earlier known ancestors having emigrated from 
Scotland to the province of Ulster, in Ireland, in the 
time of Henry VII. His grandfather was a linen- 
draper near Carrickfergus, in Ireland, and had four 
sons, all respectable farmers. Andrew, the youngest, 
married Elizabeth Hutchinson, and in 1765 he emigi'ated to America. 
He purchased lands and settled in the Waxhaw settlement, in South 
Cai-olina, where, on the 15th of March, 1767, his son Andrew, the sub- 
ject of this memoir, was bom. 

Andrew's father died about the time of his birth, leaving his widow 
and children (the two elder ones were bora in Ireland) in very comfor- 
table circumstances. She desired to see her youngest son prepared for 
the ministiy in the presbyterian chui'ch, and with this view she placed 
him under the tuition of Mr. Humphries, the principal of the Waxhaw 
academy. There he obtained a tolerable knowledge of Latin and Greek, 
and a pretty thorough training in the common branches of an English 
education. The tumults of the opening Revolution reached the region 
of the Waxhaws : and at the early age of nine years, Andrew became 
accustomed to the excitements which that event produced. His studies 
were inteiTupted, and his mind became inflamed vnth a burning zeal to 
enrol himself among the defenders of his country. 

In 1778, active military operations were commenced in South Caro- 
lina. The militia were called to the field to repel the invading foe, and 
Hugh, the eldest of Andrew's brothers, was slain. In 1780, a battle was 
fought in the Waxhaw settlement, and it was there that young Jackson 
fii"st saw the direful effects of British oppression ; and his youthful heart 
glowed with patriotic desire to avenge the bloody deed. Although but 



ll 



LIVES OF THE PRESIDENTS. 



Kntt-rs the revolutionary ai-my. — Elected to the United States senate. — Burr's expedition. 

a little more than thirteen years of age, he joined a volunteer corps with 
his brother Robert, and served under General Sumter.^ 

In 1781, both brothers were taken prisoners ; and soon after being 
released, they returned with their mother to the Waxhaws, where Rob- 
ert died from the effects of a wound* and sickness. Their mother soon 
after died, and Andrew was th.e only survivor of the Jackson family who 
came to America. 

When the Revolution closed, young Jackson, with some property and 
none to advise or restrain him, fell into bad habits, which threatened his 
ruin. But he suddenly reformed, and in 1784 commenced the study of 
law at Salisbury, North Carolina. Soon after completing his studies, 
the governor appointed him solicitor for that portion of the state now 
known as Tennessee, In his professional travels he endured many hard- 
ships, and was frequently brought into collision with the Indians.t 

In 1791, he married Mrs. Rachel Robards, a beautiful and accom- 
plished woman, who had been previously divorced from her husband. 

In 1795, he was chosen a member of the convention for forming a 
state constitution for Tennessee ; and he was elected the first representa- 
tive of the new state in Congress, and took his seat in December, 1796. 
He was soon after elected to the senate of the United States, and took 
his seat in November, 1797, being then just past thirty years of age. 
He acted with the democratic party in opposition to the administrations 
of Washington and Adams, Soon after leaving the senate, he was ap- 
pointed judge of the supreme court of his state ; and he also held the 
commission of a major-general of the militia. In 1804, he resigned his 
judgeship, and, in the enjoyment of a competent fortune, he retired to 
his plantation near Nashville. 

In 1805, he was visited by Colonel Aai'on Burr: and again in 1806 
Burr was an inmate of his house, Belie\nng Bun's expedition to be 
against Mexico, in case of a war with Spain, he promised him assist- 
ance ; but during his last visit, being suspicious that Burr's intentions 
were inimical to the United States, he withdrew his friendship, and was 
subsequently in command of a militia force detailed to arrest him for 
treason. But Burr had got beyond his reach, and was afterward arrest- 
ed by other parties. J 

When, in 1812, the United States declared war against Great Britain, 
Jackson ardently longed for an opportunity to enter the army. One 
soon offered, and in January, 1813, he descended the Mississippi at the 

• While a prisoner, he was severely wounded hy a blow upon his head by a British officer, 

because he refused to do some menial service for him. Andrew was also ordered one day to 

clean the muddy boots of a British officer, and, on refusing to do it, received a severe swordnnt 

t On account of his gallantry, the Indians called him " Sharp Knife" and "Pointed Arrow." 

X Borr always highly respected Jackson, and it is said that as early as 1815 he named him 

as a suitable candidate for the presidency. 



ANDREW JACKSOK 



73 



Expeditions against the Indians. — Battle of New Orleans. — The Seminoles. 

head of a body of volunteer troops, destined for the defence of New Or- 
leans and vicinity. They were, however, soon after marched home and 
discharged, the necessity for their serving seeming no longer to exist.* 

Early in 1813, he was appointed to the command of an expedition 
against the Creek Indians, who, in connexion with the northern tribes, 
were committing dreadful massacres upon the frontiers.! He reached 
tlie Indian country in October, 1813, and after several severe battles he 
brought them to the knee of submission. 

In May, 1814, General Jackson received the appointment of major- 
general in tho United States army, on the resignation of General Har- 
rison. During the summer he acted as diplomatist in negotiating trea- 
ties with the southern Indians, which he effected to the entire satisfac- 
tion of his government. Learning that a body of British troops were at 
Pensacola (then in possession of Spain), drilling a large number of In- 
dians for war, he advised his government to take possession of that port. 
Subsequently, having about thirty-five hundred men under his command 
for the defence of the southern country, he captured Pensacola" a}(ov i 
on his own responsibility, and put an end to difficulties in that ^^^^" 
quarter. On the 1st of December he arrived at New Orleans, and made 
his headquarters there. He set about preparing for its defence, and, in 
order to act efficiently, declared martial law. On the 21st of December 
he had a battle with the British, nine miles below the city ; and on the 
8th of Januarj^ the decisive battle of New Orleans was fought.| 
On the 13th of February an express arrived at headquarters 
with intelligence of the conclusion of peace between the United States 
and Great Britain. In every section of the Union the triumph at New 
Orleans was hailed with the greatest joy, and Jackson became exceed- 
ingly populai". 

In 1818, he was called to act in conjunction with General Gaines in 
suppressing the depredations of the Seminole Indians in Florida. In 
the course of the campaign he took possession of St. Marks, and again 
of Pensacola, although in the possession of the Spanish. This act por- 
tended trouble with Spain, but the speedy cession of Florida to the 
United States removed all cause. On the close of the campaign he re- 
signed his commission in the army. 

In 1821, President Monroe appointed him governor of Florida; and 
in 1823 he was offei-ed the station of minister to Mexico. In 1822, the 

• He was ordered to disband them at Natchez, but foreseeing tbe great misery it would 
produce, as many of them had no means of returning home, he disobeyed orders and marched 
them back. His act was subsequently approved, and the expenses paid. 

t They were instigated by Tecumseh and his brother. The latter was a prophet of an- 
bounded influence. 

% Great rejoicings succeeded ; children dressed in white strewed his way with flowers, and 
a Te Deum was sung in the cathedral, where the bishop presented the general with a chaplet 
of laareL 



74 LIVES OF THE PRESIDENTS. 

Elected president of the United States. — Nullification. — The French indemnity, 

legislature of Tennessee nominated him for president of the United 
States ; and in 1823 it elected him United States senator. In 1824, he 
was one of the five candidates for president, and received rrjore votes 
than any of his competitors, but not a sufficient number to elect him. 
In 1825, he entertained La Fayette at his estate called the " Hermi- 
tage." In 1828, he was elected president of the United States by a 
majority of more than two to one over Mr. Adams.* Mr. Calhoun was 
elected vice-president. 

The administration of Jackson, of eight years' duration, was, like his 
life, an eventful one, but our prescribed limits will permit us only to 
briefly refer to the principal events which distinguished it. 

The spirit of the advice which Jackson had given to Monroe was not 
regarded by himself, and he chose for his cabinet, and other appoint- 
ments, men of his own party exclusively.t During the first year of his 
administration a gi-eat many removals from office took place, and this 
subjected him to severe animadversions. 

The hostility of the southern portion of the Union to the tariff of 1828, 
evolved bold doctrines concerning state rights j and in 1830 the prin- 
ciple known as " nullification" was openly avowed by Mr. Calhoun and 
his southern friends. The legislature of South Carolina had previously" 

jjPgi, declared the tariff-law unconstitutional. Virginia, Georgia, 
^®~^- and Alabama, sided with South Carolina, and ^assumed that 
the sovereignty of the states was so absolute that they had the right to 
nullify any act of the general government. This was an alarming doc- 
trine, and the dissolution of the Union seemed near at hand.| But the 
energy of the president was equal to the emergency. He issued a proc- 
lamation,* and sent troops to Charleston, to act as occasion 
might require. 1 hese energetic measures were approved by 
the gi'eat body of the people, and active nullification soon disappeared. || 

In 1830, the French government having changed hands, Mr. Rives, 
United States minister at Paris, negotiated a treaty, by which the pay- 
ment of nearly five millions of dollars, for depredations upon our com- 
merce about the close of the last century, was stipulated. It was to be 
paid in six annual instalments ; but the French chamber of deputies neg- 

♦ Just before departing for Washington in 1829, to assume the reins of government, he lost 
his estimable wife. The bereavement weighed heavily upon bis spirits, and he entered opon 
his exalted duties with a sad heart. 

t He appointed Martin Van Buren, of New York, secretary of state ; Samuel D. Ingham, 
of Pennsylvania, secretary of the treasury ; John H. Eaton, of Tennessee, secretary of war , 
John Branch, of North Carolina, secretary of the navy ; and John M'Pherson Berrien, of 
Georgia, attorney-general. 

t Near the close of 1832, the legislature of South Carolina passed an act nullifying the reve- 
nue-laws, and au;horizing the governor of the state to call out the militia to sustain the act, if 
necessary. 

U A compromise-bill offered by Mr. Clay, providing for a gradual reduction of duties nntH 
1843, tended to allay the excitement, and to satisfy the less fiery advocates of nullification. 



V^ 



ANDREW JACKSON. 75 



The Black -Hawk war. — United States bank. — The Cherokees. — Seminole war. 

lected or refused to appropriate the amount, and the draft for the first 
instalment came back protested. This act the president highly resent- 
ed, and a war between this country and France became extremely prob- 
able. The matter was finally settled in 1S36, but not till years of angry 
dispute had, in a great measure, alienated from each other the people 
of the two countries. 

In 1830, by a treaty with Great Britain, direct trade was opened with 
the British colonies in the West Indies. In 1832, the war with the In- 
dian tribes on the northwest frontier, known as the " Black-Hawk war," 
occurred. From 1829 to 1833, advantageous commercial treaties were 
concluded with many of the governments of the Old World. 

In 1832, a bill for rechartering the United States bank was passed by 
both houses of Congress. The bill was vetoed by the president, and in 
183G the bank, as a national institution, ceased to exist. 

In the autumn of 1832, Jackson was re-elected president, and Martin 
Van Buren was elected vice-president. Mr. Clay was the opposing 
candidate for president. 

In 1833, the president becoming convinced that the United States 
bank was insolvent, directed tl^e removal of the government deposites 
from its custody. This measure produced great excitement, and, to 
some extent, a defection from the administration ranks. It was proved, 
by a subsequent commission, that the bank was in a sound condition. 
The great commercial revulsion of 1836-'7 was charged upon this meas- 
ure, but, as a majority of the people believed, without any just cause. 
In 1834, the Cherokee nation of Indians, inhabiting a portion of 
Georgia, came into collision with the authorities of that state, who 
claimed that by certain treaties their lands belonged to Georgia. They 
were partially ci\'ilized and had many farms under cultivation, and it 
was a peculiar hardship for them to leave and go into the wilderness 
In 1835, amicable arrangements were made for their removal, and they 
went beyond the Mississippi. This was a most unrighteous act of our 
government. 

Toward the close of 1835, the Seminole Indians in Florida com- 
menced hostilities against the white settlements on the frontier. An at- 
tempt of the govCTnment to remove the tribes beyond the Mississippi was 
the immediate cause of the war. Osceola was the chief wanior of the 
Seminoles, and by his artful dissimulation in diplomacy, and boldness in 
war, the contest lasted for several years. 

In 1835-'6, a large number of banking institutions sprang up in the 
several states, and the facility thus afforded for obtaining money, fostered 
a spirit of speculation, which finally ended in a business revulsion such 
as was never witnessed here before. The celebrated " specie circular," 
issued from the treasury department in 1836, requiring, the payment of 



76 



LIVES OF THE PRESIDENTS. 



The "Specie Circular." — Expunging resolutions. — Jackson's death and character. 

gold and silver for public lands, gave the first povsrerful check to mad 
Bchemes of speculation, and it doubtless prevented in a measure the ab- 
sorption of the entire public domain by a few individuals. 

In the fall of 1836, another presidential election occurred. The oppo- 
sing candidates w^ere Martin Van Buren (democratic), and General Har- 
rison and Judge White (opposition). Van Buren was elected president 
and Richard M. Johnson vice-president. 

In January, 1837, a resolution was passed, expunging from the jour- 
nals of Congress a resolution offered by Mr. Clay in 1834, censuring the 
course of the president in removing the government funds from the Uni- 
ted States bank. The last official act of Jackson's administi-ation was 
an informal veto (by retaining it in his possession till after the adjourn- 
ment of Congress) of a bill so far counteracting the " specie circular" as 
to allow the reception of the notes of specie-paying banks in payment 
for public lands. 

On the 3d of March, 1837, his administration closed; and having pub- 
lished a farewell address, he retired to the " Hermitage" in Tennessee, 
where he passed the remainder of his days. For the last two years of 
his life he was physically quite infirm, but his mind lost but little of its 
energy. On the 8th of June, 1845, he expired, in the seventy-ninth year 
of his age. Public funeral obsequies were performed throughout the 
country,* for it might be truly said, a " great man has fallen in Israel." 
His estate was left to the Donelson family, who were relatives of Mrs. 
Jackson, he having no blood-relations in this counti-y. 

In person, General Jackson was six feet one inch high, remarkably 
straight, and thin, never weighing over one hundred and fifty pounds. 
His sharp, intelligent eye was a dark blue. His manners were pleas- 
ing, his address commanding, and the most remarkable feature of his 
character was firmness. Honest and conscientious, no obstacle could 
prevent his doing what he judged to be right. Benevolence was in him 
a leading virtue, and his moral character was ever above reproach. 

• A colossal equestrian statae i3 to be erected upon an arch to span Pennsylvania avenue. 
Dear the capitol, at Washington. It is to be erected by private subscription. 



I 



MARTIN VAN BUREN, 

THE EIGHTH PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES. 




ITHERTO, in tracing the lives of our chief magis- 
trates, we have been carried back to the scenes of the 
Revolution, for they came upon the stage of life be- 
fore that eventful period. They were also Anglo- 
Americans ; but the eighth president was, in relation 
to our war of independence, like St. Paul, as " one 
born out of due time," and his fatherland was not of the British realm. 
The Van Buren family were among the earlier emigrants from Hol- 
land to the New Netherlands (New York). They settled upon lands 
on the east bank of the Hudson, now known by the name of Kinder- 
hook, in Columbia county. Martin Van Buren was bom at Kinder- 
hook on the 5th of December, 1782. His father was a farmer in mod- 
erate circumstances, and both of his parents were distinguished for sa- 
gacity, sound sense, and uprightness of character. His early education 
was extremely limited, but the little opportunity afforded him at the 
Kinderhook academy, for acquiring any learning beyond the mere rudi- 
ments of a good English education, was industriously improved. At 
the age of fourteen years he entered the office of Francis Sylvester, a 
lawyer of Kinderhook, and very soon gave promise of future eminence, 
being, even at that age, a keen observer of men and things, a good ex- 
tempore speaker, and quite a ready writer. During his long course of 
study* he was almost constantly employed in cases in justices' couits, 
and when his term expired he was an accomplished pleader at the bar, 
and a well-informed politician. His father was a whig of the Revolu- 
tion and a democrat during the administration of the elder Adams, and 
therefore Martin was trained in the democratic school, its adherents 
then forming a small minority in his native town and county. The last 
year of his preparatory studies was spent in the office of William P. 
Van Ness, an eminent lawyer and leading democrat in the city of New 

• At that time, students at law were not admitted to practice until they had studied seven 
years, unless they had received a collegiate education. 



80 



LIVES OF THE PRESIDENTS. 



His professional life. — Elected to the state senate. — Opposed to Clinton. — Elected to the U. 3 senate. 

York. There he became acquainted with many of the leading politi- 
cians of the day, among whom was Aaron Burr, then vice-president of 
the United States. 

In November, 1803, Mr. Van Buren was admitted to practice in the 
supreme couit of the United States, and in his native town he formed 
a law-partnership vnth his half-brother Mr. Van Alen. In 1806, he 
married Miss Hannah Hoes, who was distantly related to him. She 
died in 1818, leaving him four sons. Mr. Van Buren has never mariied 
again. In 1808, he was appointed surrogate of Columbia county, and 
from that time until 1815 he had a lucrative practice, and gained almost 
the apex of renown in his profession. In 1815, he was appointed attor- 
ney-general of the state, and he continued the practice of law until 1828, 
when he was elected governor of the state of New York. 

Mr. Van Buren's political career has been a brilliant one. He en- 
tered the field as early as 1804, when Aaron Burr and Morgan Lewis 
were the opposing democratic candidates for goveraor of the state. He 
supported Mr. Lewis. In 1807, he wannly supported Daniel D. Tomp- 
kins for the same office ; and during the entire administration of Mr. 
Jefferson it received his support. He was opposed to the rechartering 
of the United States bank in 1811, and he warmly defended the course 
of the vice-president (George Clinton), who gave his casting vote against 
the measure. 

In 1812 (then thirty years of age), he was elected to the state senate. 
Although favorable to all the strong measures (even to the declaration 
of war) adopted against Great Britain in 1812-'13, yet he gave his vote 
in the senate to De Witt Clinton for president of the United States.* 

In 1816, he was appointed a regent of the university, and was also 
re-elected to the senate for four years, where he warmly advocated the 
Erie-canal project. He became personally and politically opposed to 
Mr. Clinton; and when, in 1818, that gentleman was elected governor, 
Mr. Van Buren opposed his administration, and was one of the leaders 
of that portion of the democratic party an alleged association of which 
at the seat of government was known by the name of the " Albany Re- 
gency." Mr, Clinton's friends having a majority in the " Council of 
Appointment," Mr. Van Buren was removed from the office of attorney- 
general. It was afterward tendered to him, but he declined it. 

In 1821, Mr. Van Buren was elected to the senate of the United 
States. He was also an active and leading member of the convention 
that met that year to revise the constitution of the state of New York. 

• Mr. Clinton was nominated by that portion of the democratic party in New York who 
were opposed to the war. He was also very popular with tlie people at large ; and, in sup- 
porting him, Mr. Van Buren believed he was acting in accordance with the wishes of a ma- 
jority of his own party. 



=J} 



MARTIN VAN BUREN. 



81 



Appointed secretary of state. — Appointed minister to England. — Elected picsidentof the United States. 

In 1827, he was re-elected to the United States senate for six years. 
In 1828, he was elected governor of his state. In a biief message 
in January, 1829, he proposed the celebrated " safety -fund" system 
for banking institutions. In 1829, General Jackson appointed him 
secretary of state, and he resigned the ofRce of governor. In 1831, 
on the dissolution of Jackson's cabinet, Mr. Van Buren was appoint- 
ed minister to Great Britain. The appointment was not confirmed 
by the senate, and he was recalled. His friends looked upon this as 
political persecution, and he was nominated for and elected vice-presi- 
dent of the United States in 1832. In 1836, he was elected president, 
and Colonel Richard M. Johnson was elected vice-president. Mr. Van 
Buren was inaugurated on the 4th of March, 1837. Like General 
Jackson, he selected his cabinet from among his political friends.* 

In consequence of the expansion of the paper currency by the almost 
limitless discounts of the newly-created banks, mad speculations at home 
and excessive importations from abroad were fostered, which finally 
reached a crisis, and in 1837 a revulsion took place, and a commercial 
panic spread over the whole country, producing wide-spread distress- 
The banks suspended specie payments (sanctioned in New York by a 
legislative act), and so deranged became the currency and the whole 
machinery of trade, that in September, 1837, the president convened an 
extraordinary Congi-ess,t in compliance with the prayer of petitions 
from all parts of the Union. In his message, the president proposed 
what his opponents termed the " sub-treasury scheme." This measure 
was opposed, not only by his political enemies, but by his democratic 
friends who were concerned in banks,| and it was at that time very un 
popular. The subject of the sub-treasury was postponed. An act was 
passed authorizing the issue of ten millions of dollars in treasury-notes ; 
also an appropriation of $1,600,000 for the Florida or Seminole war. 

At the opening of the session of Congi'ess in December, the presi- 
dent again pressed the independent-treasury scheme ; but the measure, 
though supported in the senate, was defeated in the house. It was 
adopted at the next session, and received the president's signature on the 
4th of July, 1840. In 1838, the territory of Iowa was established; and 
Ml'. Preston, of South Carolina, introduced a resolution in the senate in 
favor of the annexation of Texas to the United States. During the 

• He appointed John Forsyth, of Georgia, secretary of state ; Levi Woodbury, of New 
Hampshire, secretary of the treasury; Joel R,. Poinsett, of South Carolina, secretary of war; 
Mahlon Dickerson, of New Jersey, secretary of the navy; Amos Kendall, of Kentucky, post- 
master-general; and Benjamin F. Butler, of New York, attorney-general. With the excep- 
tion of Mr. Poinsett, these gentlemen were all members of Jackson's cabinet 

t It remained in session forty-three days. 

X This portion of the democratic party separated from the administration, and were known 
as conservatives. They subsequently fell into the ranks of the old opposition, or, as it was 
and still is termed, " whig party." 

6 



82 



LIVES OF THE PRESIDENTS. 



The Canada revolt — Election of Harrison. — Van Huron's retirement 

yeare 1837-'8, the " Canada rebellion" broke out : and so strongly were 
the sympathies of the Americans aroused, that large numbers flocked to 
the standard of the insurgents. This threatened serious consequences to 
the peace existing between our government and that of Great Britain, 
and the president, by proclamation and other measures, successfully 
checked the belligerent movements of our people on the frontier. 

During the summer of 1839, the president visited the state of New 
York for the first time since his inauguration, and was everywhere greet- 
ed with enthusiasm by his political friends, and with great personal re- 
spect by his opponents. The derangement of the currency and prosti'a- 
tion of trade (attributed, as usual, to the mal-administration of the gov- 
ernment) caused great political changes : and of the representatives in 
the twenty-sixth Congress, there were one hundred and nineteen demo- 
crats and one hundred and eighteen whigs,* leaving out of view five rep- 
resentatives from New Jersey whose seats were contested. After sev- 
eral stormy debates, the democratic members were admitted. 

In 1840, Mr. Van Buren was a candidate for re-election, but the great 
political changes, from causes before hinted at, as indicated in the state 
elections, gave but little hope for his success. General Harrison, the 
candidate of the opposition, was elected by a large majority. John 
Tyler, of Virginia, was elected vice-president. 

Mr. Van Buren's administration closed on the 3d of March, 1841. It 
was an exciting one, and its character can not now be properly estimated. 
It must be left to the just verdict of posterity to decide how far its 
measures have been conducive of good to the country. It has been 
remarked that the great event of his administration, by which it " will 
hereafter be known and designated, is the divorce of bank and state in 
the fiscal affairs of the federal government, and the return, after half a 
century of deviation, to the original design of the constitution." 

Since his retirement from office, Mr. Van Buren has resided upon his 
beautiful estate at Kinderhook, where he enjoys, in a large degree, those 
essentials of human happiness, "health, wealth, and troops of friends," 
His private character is above all censure, and in public life no man ever 
had or desei-ved warmer or truer friends. Pure motives, stern integrity, 
felicitous powers of conversation, amiability of character, habitual self- 
respect, yet a delicate regard for the feelings of others, and equanimity 
of deportment in both public and private life, he is an ornament of the 
social circle, and justly the pride of his country. 

In personal appearance, Mr. Van Buren is about the middle size, erect, 
and rather inclined to coi-pulency. His hair (formerly light) is now white, 
his eye is bright and deeply penetrating, and his expansive forehead indi- 
cates great intellectual power. He is now (1847) sixty-five years of age. 

• Tlie name of "wbig" was adopted by tlio opposition daring the second administration of 
General Jackson, and is still the name of tliat party. 



WILLIAM HENRY HARRISON, 

THE NINTH PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES. 




)ILLIAM HENRY HARRISON was boi-n at 
Berkley, about twenty-five miles from Richmond 
Virginia, on the 9th of February, 1773. His fa 
ther, Benjamin Harrison, was an active pati-iot of 
the Revolution,* and was subsequently governor 
of Virginia. William Henry was the youngest 
of three sons, and the favorite of his father. After completing a colle- 
giate course at Hampden Sydney, he was sent to Philadelphia to prose- 
cute the study of medicine. He had scarcely arrived there, when the 
shocking news of his father's death reached him, and damped his ardor 
for his profession. Contraiy to the wishes and advice of his guardian 
(the celebrated Robert Morris), he resolved to enter the army ; and hav- 
ing obtained from Washington an ensign's commission, he departed for 
the western wilderness, to engage in the Indian wars of that region. He 
reached Fort Washington (now Cincinnati) in time to hear of the defeat 
of the whites, and the slaughter of brave leaders and their men. 

When General Wayne, in 1794, took the command in the northwest 
young Harrison v/as soon noticed for his valor, and made one of his aids 
He was promoted to captain ; and after the treaty of Greenville, in 1795 
he was left in command of Fort Washington. He soon after married 
the daughter of Judge Symmes, the proprietor of the Miami purchase, 
and, resigning his military commission, entered upon civil official duties 
as secretary of che northwestern territory. 

In 1799, Harrison was elected the first delegate to Congress from the 
northwestern territory .J Through his influence in Congress, such salu- 
tary regulations respecting the sale and occupancy of public lands at the 
west were effected, that emigration rapidly filled the country vidth settlers. 
When, soon after," Indiana was erected into a territory, Harri- 
son was appointed governor thereof by President Adams. He 
was clothed with extraordinary powei^s, which subsequently became ne- 
cessarx', for in their exercise he was instrumental in saving the settlers of 

• He was a representative from Virginia in the continental Congress, and was chairman of 
the committee ol' the whole house when the Declaration of Independence was agreed to. He 
was also one of the signers of that instrument. 

I Now comprising the states of Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Michigan, and the then nndefined 
territory now Known as Iowa and Wisconsin. The venerable General St. Clair was the gov- 
ernor of the territory 



a 1801. 



86 LIVES OF THE PRESIDENTS. 

Battle of Tippecanoe. — Klected president of the United States. — His character and death. 

that frontier from the hatchet of the savages, whetted by British intrigue.* 
When the war of 1812 broke out, Hanison found the Indians ripe for 
conflict, under the teachings of the brave Tecumseh and his prophet- 
brother. Before that event he took the field in person, and, by his skill 
and bravery, obtained a decisive victory over the savages at Tippecanoe, 
the village of Tecumseh. In 1812, he received the appointment of bre- 
vet major-general in the Kentucky militia, and on the surrender of Hull, 
he was appointed a major-general in the army of the United States. 
In October, 1813,* he achieved the battle of the Thames.t 

b Oct 5. , . - , . ... - 

In 1814, he resigned his commission, m consequence of a 
misunderstanding with General Armstrong, the secretary of war. Pres- 
ident Madison, who held him in the gi'eatest esteem, deeply deplored 
the act of resignation. General HaiTison retired to his farm at North 
Bend, in Ohio, but the voice of the people called him forth to rep- 
resent them at various times, both in the state legislature and in the 
Congress of the United States. In 1824, he was elected to the senate of 
the United States ; and in 1828, he was appointed minister to the repub- 
lic of Colombia, in South Ameiica. In consequence of some difference 
of views respecting the Panama question, General Jackson recalled him. 
He retired to his estate at North Bend, with the intention of passing the 
remainder of his days there in the bosom of his family. But the voice 
of the people again called him forth, and in 1840 he was elected presi- 
dent of the United States by an overwhelming majority — 234 against 
60. John Tyler, of Virginia, was elected vice-president. 

General Harrison was inaugurated on the 4th of March, 1841, and 
made his cabinet appointments from among his political friends.f The 
sound of rejoicing that attended his elevation had scarcely died upon the 
ear, when a funeral-knell was heard, and the beloved and veteran states- 
man was a corpse in the presidential mansion ! On the 4th of April, just 
one month after his inauguration, he expired, aged sixty-eight years.|| 

In person, he was tall and slender, and always enjoyed g^-eat bodily 
vigor. His dark eye was remarkable for its keenness and intelligence. 
Throughout a long life, he was distinguished for stem integrity, purity 
of purpose, and patriotism without alloy. 

• Among other duties, was that of commissioner to treat with the Indians. He concluded 
fifteen treaties, and purchased their titles to upward of seventy millions of acres of land. 

i The victory was achieved by the famous charge of Colonel R. M. Johnson at the head of 
mounted infantry, a manoeuvre originating with General Harrison. Tecumseh was killed by 
Johnson's own hand. Congress voted a gold medal to be presented to Harrison. 

I He appointed Daniel Webster, of Massachusetts, secretary of state ; Thomas Ewing, of 
Ohio, secretary of the treasury ; John Bell, of Tennessee, secretary of war ; George E. Badger, 
of North Carolina, secretary of the navy ; Francis Granger, of New York, postmaster-gen- 
eral ; and John J. Crittenden, of Kentucky, attorney-general. 

II He fell a victim to the fatigue incident to the attention paid to ceaseless clamor for office, 
which greatly increased a slight disease caused by a cold. His last words were, " Sir, I wish 
yoa to understand the principles of the government I wish them carried out I ask nothing 
more.' 



JOHN TYLER, 

THE TENTH PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES. 




GAIN, for the sixth time, we record the birthplace of 
a president in Virginia. The ancestors of John Tyler 
were among the early English settlers of that state.* 
His father was the intimate fnend of Jefferson, Patrick 
Henry, Edmund Randolph, and other leading Virginia 
patriots, and he was one of the most active "rebels" of the Revolution. 
He held some of the highest offices (among which was governor) in Vir- 
ginia, and was a man greatly beloved by the people. 

The subject of this sketch was bom on the 29th of March, 1790, in 
Charles City county, Virginia. While a mere child, he was studious, 
and at the age of twelve years he entered William and Mary college 
He giaduated at the age of seventeen years, with distinguished honor, 
and at once applied himself to the study of law, at first with his fa- 
ther, and afterward with Edmund Randolph. At nineteen he was ad- 
mitted to the bar, without any inquiry having been made respecting 
his age ; and so successful were his efforts, that within three rrionths he 
was retained in almost every case brought before the court of his native 
county. 

At the age of twenty-one years," young Tyler was elected, 
by an almost unanimous vote, a member of the Virginia legis- 
lature. He was attached to the democratic party, and became exceed- 
ingly popular in his state as an orator and sound statesman.t He sup- 

• His lineage connected him with the famous popular leader known as Wat Tyler, who, in 
the fourteenth century, headed an insurrection in England, and demanded from Richard II. a 
recognition of the rights of the people. He lost his life in the effort. 

t He was a representative five successive years. On one occasion he received all the votes 
polled in his district except five ; and afterward, when a candidate for Congress, he received 
one hundred and ninety-nine votes out of two hundred. In the Virginia legislature, he assert- 
ed the correctness of the doctrine of instruction, which, twenty-five years afterward, he did 
not forget, but acted upon the principles he then laid down. 



90 LIVES OF THE PRESIDENTS. 

Elected governor of Virginia. — Elected United States senator. — Resigns his seat in the senate. 

ported the administration during the war with Great Britain * and in 
1816 he was elected to Congress, He served nearly two terms, but 
toward the close of the latter, in 1821, ill health compelled him to re- 
eioTi his station, and he retired to his farmt in Charles City county, car- 
rying Avith him the profound respect of all parties. 

Mr. Tyler did not long remain in private life. In 1823, he was again 
elecled a member of the Virginia legislature, where he took the lead in 
all matters of public utility ; and many of the finest works in that state 
are the result of his untiring labors. 

In 1825, Mr. Tyler was elected governor of Virginia by a very large 
majority .J He was re-elected the following year, but resigned, in con- 
sequence of being elected to succeed John Randolph in the United States 
senate. He took his seat in that body in December, 1827. He voted 
a"-'dinst the tariff-bill of 1828, and was a firm supporter of General Jack- 
son on his accession to the presidency, but ever pursuing an indepen- 
dent and consistent course. He sometimes differed with the president, 
and always honestly and frankly avowed his opinions. During the ses 
sion of 1831-'2, he opposed the rechartering of the United States bank, 
and voted against it, as an unconstitutional measure.]] He also voted 
ao^ainst the tariff-bill of 1832 ; but in the course of a speech in the sen- 
ate, he inculcated doctrines of concession, upon which Mr. Clay, in 1833, 
predicated his famous compromise-act, for which Mr. Tyler voted. 

In 1833, he was re-elected to the senate for six years. Siding with 
the nullifiers, he withdrew his support from President Jackson ; and he 
also opposed the removal of the government deposites from the United 
States bank. His course in the senate separated him from the presi- 
dent's friends in Virginia, who subsequently supported Mr. Van Buren. 

In 1836, the legislature of Virginia instructed the senators from that 
state to vote for expunging from the journals of the senate the resolution 
of Mr. Clay, censuring the president. As Mr. Tyler approved of the 
resolution, he could not obey instructions, and, true to his avowed prin- 
ciples, he resigned his seat, and was succeeded by Mr, Rives. 

In the spring of 1838, the whigs of James City county elected Mr 
Tyler a member of the Virginia legislature. In 1839, he was elected 
a member of the whig convention that met at Harrisburg to nominate 
a candidate for president of the United States. He was chosen vice- 

• He raised a Tolunteer corps when Richmond was threatened, but they were never brought 
into the field. In allusion to this, his opponeuta, while he waa president, called him ' Captain 
Tyler," in dfirision. 

t In 1813, he married Miss Lucretia Christian, daughter of Robert Christian, of New-Kent 
eonnty, Virginia. She died at Washington, September 10, 1842. 

X In Jnly. 1835, he delivered in the capitol square, at Richmond, an eloquent eulogy on tha 
death of Thomas Jefferson. 

I For the same reason he voted against its recbarter in 1818. 



1 



JOHN TYLER. 91 



Elected vice-president of the United States. — Becomes president — His vetoes. — Annexation of Texas. 

president of the convention, and warmly supported Mr. Clay for the 
nomination. General HaiTison was nominated for president, and Mr. 
Tyler for vice-president, and in 1840 they were both elected. 

As we have already stated, General Harrison's administration was 
only of a month's duration ; and when the veteran expired," ^ ^p^, ^^ 
Mr. Tyler, in accordance with the provisions of the constitu- ^'^*^- 
tion, became president of the United States. He retained Hariison's 
cabinet in office, and, by his many removals from place of the support- 
ers of Van Buren's administration, the whigs believed that he intended 
to carry out all their measures. His first message, too, recommending 
a bank or fiscal agent of some kind, gave them hopes ; but when a bill 
(containing, as the framers supposed, a compromise sufficient to over- 
come the president's constitutional objections to a bank) passed boch 
houses, and was presented to him for his signature,* he sent it j ^u^st 6, 
back with his objections — in other words, vetoed it. Having, ^^''~- 
in his veto-message, shadowed forth a fiscal agent, a bill in accordance 
therewith was framed and adopted : but this, too, he vetoed,' ^ ggpt 9^ 
and there not being a constitutional majority in its favor, it was ^®'*^- 
lost. The sub-treasuiy law in the meanwhile had been repealed ; gi'eat 
excitement prevailed, and all of Mr. Tyler's cabinet, except Mr. Web- 
ster, resigned. The president immediately filled his cabinet with promi- 
nent whigs and conservatives.* 

The most important acts of the long session of 1841-'2 (two hundred 
and sixty-nine days) were, a new tariff-law for revenue and protection, 
and an apportionment of representatives according to the census of 
1840.t An important treaty with Great Britain, settling the northeast- 
ern boundary of the Union, was ratified at Washington on the 28th of 
August, 1842. In May, 1843, the president appointed Caleb Gushing, 
of Massachusetts, a commissioner to the Chinese government. On the 
12th of April, 1844, a treaty was concluded at Washington, providing 
for the annexation of Texas to the United States, but on the 8th of June 
it was rejected by the senate. On the 25th of January, a joint resolu- 
tion for annexing Texas was adopted by the house of representatives, 
by a vote of 120 to 98 ; and the same was adopted in the senate on the 
1st of March, by a vote of 27 to 25, and the same day it was approved 
by the president. Thus, two days before the expiration of his term of 
office, Mr. Tyler had the satisfaction of sanctioning by his signature an 
act, the consummation of which he had earnestly desired. On the 4th 

• He appointed Walter Forward, of Pennsylvania, secretary of the treasury ; John M'Lean, 
of Ohio, secretary of war ; Abel P. Upshur, of Virginia, secretary of the navy ; Charles A. 
Wickliffe, of Kentucky, postmaster-general ; and Hugh S. Legarfe, of South Carolina, attorney- 
general Judge M'Lean declining the appointment, John C. Spencer, of New York, was 
appointed. 

t The ratb was fixed at seventy thousand six hundred and eighty for each represenlalive. 



92 LIVES OF THE PRESIDENTS. 

His retirement — His administration. — His person and character. 

of July following, a constitutional convention that had assembled at 
Austin, in Texas, assented to the terms proposed by the government ot 
the United States, and that state became a part of our great confedera- 
cy. The next winter, Generals Houston and Rusk (the former had 
been president of Texas) took their seats in the United States senate as 
her representatives. 

Mr. Tyler was not a candidate for president,* and on the 4th of March, 
1845, he resigned the office into the hands of James K. Polk, who had 
been elected to succeed him. He soon after left Washington, and re- 
tired to his estate near Williamsburg, in Virginia, where he still re- 
sides.t 

Of the character of Mr. Tyler's administration, and his personal rela- 
tions thereto, it is yet too early to speak. His independent course in 
vetoing the bank-bills, and other measures, greatly exasperated the party 
who had elevated him to office, and he was denounced as a traitor ; 
while his equally independent course in opposing General Jackson in 
his measures against the United States bank, and also his alliance with 
the whigs during Mr. Van Buren's administration, denied him the con- 
fidence of the democrats. He himself said : " I appeal from the vitu- 
peration of the present day to the pen of impartial history, in the full 
confidence that neither my motives nor my acts will bear the intei-pre- 
tation which has, for sinister pui-poses, been placed upon them." As 
an executive of the people's will, he exhibited all the necessary vigor 
of a chief magistrate. " Nor is it to be denied," says one of his politi- 
cal opponents, " that the foreign relations of the United States were 
ably managed during his presidential term, and that he generally sur- 
rounded himself with able counsellors in his cabinet." 

In person, Mr. Tyler is rather tall and thin, with light complexion, 
blue eyes, and prominent featui'es. He is plain and affable in his man- 
ners ; in private life is amiable, hospitable, and courteous ; and is much 
beloved for his many virtues by all who know him. 

• When, in May, the democratic convention assembled at Baltimore to ftominate candidates 
for president and vice-president, delegates from various parts of the Union, favorable to Mr. 
Tyler, met in that city and placed his name in nomination. At the urgent solicilaiion of the 
friends of the democratic nominees, Mr. Tyler, in August, withdrew his name from the can- 
vasa. 

t On the 26th of June, 1844, Mr. Tyler was married in the city of New York, to Misa Julia 
Gardiner, the daughter of the late David Gardiner, who was killed by the explosion on board 
the steamship Friaceton. 



JAMES KNOX POLK, 

THE ELEVENTH PRESIDENT Of THE UNITED STATES. 




HE family of the late incumbent of the presidential 
chair came from Ireland in the early part of the last 
century. Ezekiel Polk, the grandfather of James K. 
Polk, was the son of the emigrant, whose name was 
Robert, who, just previous to his removal to America, 
married a Miss Gullet, the heii'ess of an estate called 
Morning Hill. Sometime previous to the commencement of the revo- 
lutionary war, the ancestors of James K. Polk settled near the westeiTi 
frontier of North Carolina, and they were among the most ardent patri- 
ots when that period of trouble arrived.* James K. Polk was born in 
Mecklenberg county. North Carolina, on the 2d of November, 1795. 
In the autumn of 1806, his father, with a wife and ten children, re- 
moved to Tennessee, upon the Duck river, which region was then a 
wilderness. By application and perseverance, James acquired a good 
English education, and at the age of seventeen he was placed in a mer- 
cantile house. The pursuit did not accord with his taste, and after much 
solicitation he prevailed upon his father to allow him to prepare for a 
collegiate course, with a view to the acquirement of the profession of 
the law. At the age of twenty," he entered the university of 
North Carolina. There he was a distinguished pupil. At 
each semi-annual examination he took the first honors, and he gradu- 
ated" with the reputation of being the best scholar in matho- 
matica and the classics in the institution. 



h 161S. 



• Colonel Thomas Polk, the great-uncle of James k. polk.was the prime mover in the con 
vention of the committee of safety in the county of Mecklenberg, North Carolina, who, on the 
20th of May, 1775, nearly fourteen months before the Declaration of Independence was adopt- 
ed by the continental Congress, passed resolutions declaring themselves free and independent 
of the British crown. He was chairman of the convention, and he was related to John M'Nitt 
Alexander, the secretary, and also to Dr. Brevard, the author of the resoiations. 



96 LIVES OF THE PRESIDENTS. 

Elected a member of the Tennessee legislature. — Elected to Congress. -Elected president 

He returned to Tennessee on leaving the university, with greatly 
impaired health (the result of too close application to study), and com 
menced the study of law in the office of the late Felix Grundy. At the 
close of 1820 he was admitted to the bar, and commenced his profes- 
sional career in the county of Maury. He soon took the lead in his 
profession, and his plain common sense and amenity of manners en- 
deared him to a large circle of warm friends. 

In 1823, he was elected a member of the Tennessee legislature, and 
this was almost his initial step in politics. Ke was a member of that 
body for two years, and his ability, eloquence, and industiy, gave him 
a solid reputation and a wide influence.* He was chosen in August, 
1825, to represent his district in Congress, where, through all the muta- 
tions of party, he preserved inviolate the democratic principles which 
he had regarded with veneration from his earliest youth. With one or 
two exceptions, he was the youngest member of the house : yet it was 
not long before he was one of the leading men there, and for nearly 
fourteen years his public life and the history of the house of represent- 
atives are identical.t He early took ground against a United States 
bank, and during the warfare of President Jackson against that insti- 
tution, he was one of the firmest supporters of the administration. He 
was also an oJ>ponent of a high-protective tariff, and made a powerful 
speech against the collection of a surplus revenue from the people. 

In December, 1835, Mr. Polk was elected speaker of the house of 
representatives ; and he was again elected at the extra session in 1837. 
During five sessions he so performed the duties of speaker, that he ob- 
tained the cordial friendship and respect of both parties. 

Having served as a representative for fourteen years, he declined a 
re-election in 1839. He was nominated for the office of governor, and 
in Auo-ust, 1839, he was elected by a majority of more than twenty- 
five hundred over Governor Cannon, He was a candidate for re-elec- 
tion in 1841, but was defeated by a larger majority than he was previ- 
ously elected by. He was again a candidate for governor in 1843, and 
was again defeated. On the 29th of May, 1844, the democratic conven- 
tion at Baltimore nominated him for president of the United States, and 
in December following, the electoral college declarea him chosen to fill 
that high tnist, by a majority over Mr. Clay of sixty-five. George M. 
Dallas, of Pennsylvania, was elected vice-president. 

Mr. Polk was inaugurated on the 4th of March, 1845 ; and the next 

• He was one of those who, in 1823-'4, called General Jackson from his retirement and 
elected him a member of the United States senate. Every branch of the Polk family have 
always been attached to the democratic party. Some of them in Maryland, who were the 
only democrats of note in Somerset county, were distinguished as " the democratic family." 

t With the exception of one occasion, he was never absent from his place in the house a 
day daring his whole term of service there 



JAMES KNOX POLK. 97 



Events connected with the Mexican War. 



day, the senate being in session, he made the nominations for nis cabi- 
net, which wei'e confimied. 

The chief events of Mr. Polk's administration are, the commencement, 
continuance, and conclusion, of a war with Mexico, and the discovery 
of the rich gold-mines of California. Of the various causes which led 
to hostilities, we have not room to speak in detail; we must therefore 
be content with a brief notice of the leading facts connected with our 
late difficulties with that republic. 

Texas, ha\'ing maintained her independence of Mexico for nine years, 
and obtained a recognition of its independence from the United States 
and the principal powers of Europe,t applied for and obtained admis- 
sion into the American Union by an act, approved by President Tyler 
or the 2d of March, 1845. Mexico had never acknowledged the inde- 
pendence of Texas (although that government had offered to do so, con- 
ditionally), and therefore the annexation to our territory of a province 
which she claimed as her own, was deemed by her a sufficient reason 
for terminating diplomatic intei'course with our government. 

On the 6th of March, 1S45, the Mexican minister at Washington de- 
manded his passports, declared his mission ended, and protested against 
the act of Congress, which, as he averred, had severed from Mexico an 
integi'al part of her dominions. Herrara, the president of Mexico, is- 
sued a proclamation, denouncing the act as a breach of faith, and calling 
upon the people to rally in support of their rights. Small detachmenta 
of Mexican troops wei'e already on the frontier of Texas, and larger 
bodies were ordered to the Rio Grande with the avowed object of en- 
forcing the jurisdiction of Mexico over Texas. 

By the terms of the treaty of annexation, the United States govern- 
ment was bound to protect the new state ; and in view of the belligerent 
movements of Mexico, it was deemed advisable to send a military force 
to the Texan frontier, to act as circumstances might require. Accord- 
iSgly, in the latter part of July, 1845, the United States government sent 
thither several military companies under the command of General Taylor, 
which took position upon an island near Corpus Christi bay, and north 
of the river Neuces. General Paredes, having been invested by the 
Mexican people with dictatorial powers, prepared to invade Texas with 
an army of six or seven thousand men. To guard against the evils of 
this threatened invasion, General Taylor broke up his encampment at 



t From the earliest period of their independence, the Texan people desired a reannexation 
to the American Union, and cvertares for an acknowledgment of their independence, and with 
it annexation implied, were twice made to our government, and refused, on acconnt of exist- 
ing treaties with Mexico. But these treaties were afterward so grossly violated by the suc- 
cessive executives of the Mexican government, that delicacy on that point was no longer 
demanded, and Tcxaa was acknowledged a free and independent state. 

7 



98 



LIVES OF THE PRESIDENTS. 



'J'he Mexicrin wiir. — The KHminialriitiijii, pt-rsoii. aiid character, of the presiUent. 



Corpus Christi, and took position upon the Rio Grande opposite Matamoras. 
It was while marching toward this point with a portion of his little army, that 
he was attacked by a large body of Mexicans who had crossed the Rio Grande, 
oMayS. and the battles of Palo Alto" and Resaca de la Palma'' ensued, 
b May 9. which proved victorious to the Americans. On the 24th of May 
Matamoras surrendered, and the Americans took position on Mexican soil. 

When the news of actual hostilities reached our government. Congress was 
in session, and an act was immediately passed authorizing the president to 
raise by voluntary enlistment fifty thousand men, and also appropriated ten 
millions of dollars for the prosecution of the war in Mexico. On the 2lst Sep. 
tember, 1846, the Americans under Taylor attacked Monterey. It surrendered 
on the 24th. About the same time, divisions under Wool, Kearney, Fremont, 
and others, penetrated New Mexico and California, and took possession of some 
of the principal towns, among them Monterey on the Pacific. 

Toward the close of 1846, General Scott was ordered to take the chief com- 
mand in Mexico. He reached the Rio Grande in January, 1847, and soon be- 
gan preparations to attack Vera Cruz, the nearest seaport to the city of Mexico. 
On the 22d of February, Taylor achieved a decisive victory at Buena Vista, 
and the Mexican army under Santa Anna was entirely routed. This battle 
closed the war in that quarter. On the 13th of March, 1847, the United States 
military and naval forces invested Vera Cruz, and on the 29th the city and 
castle surrendered. Nearly every town on the gulf was taken possession of by 
our navy, and General Scott at once proceeded toward the capital. At Cerro 
Gordo he was met by Santa Anna with about twelve thousand troops, and a 
desperate battle ensued. Santa Anna was defeated, and the Americans pushed 
forward toward the city of Mexico. Scott fought two victorious battles near 
the city ; the Mexican authorities proposed an armistice, for the purpose of ne- 
gotiating peace. Hostilities, however, soon recommenced, and, on the 16th of 
September, Scott entered the capital in triumph. After this event, all hostile 
movements were confined to that quarter, and these consisted in slight skir^ 
mishcs between belligerent detachments. After considerable delay, a Mexican 
congress was convened, and a treaty between the two republics was concluded 
and ratified by both parties.* 

At one time during the last session of Congress, the slavery question threaJP 
ened dire evil to our happy Union, but patriotism and sound judgment governed 
our councils and the cloud passed away. 

In person. Mr. Polk Avas of middle stature. A quick, penetrating eye, ex- 
pansive fcreliead, and grave expression, were protninent features. In private 
life, his amiability of character and purity of morals secured the profound re- 
spect and esteem of all that knew him ; and his public career was marked by 
amenity of manners, which commanded the universal respect of his oppo- 
nents. He was in his fifty-fourth year when he retired from office on the 4th 
of March, 1849. He died at his residence in Tennessee, on the 15ih of June 
following, of chronic diarrhoea. 

* This trciity eeeured to thn United States, by cession, all of New Mexico and California, for which 
we pay to Mexico fifteen millions of dollars, the estahlislied claims of our citizens a-ain.-t that govcrn- 
mcDtto be deducted therefrom. The nowly-acquired territory gives us an extensive scacoa.'t on the 
Pacific, and includes the rich gold mines, to which emigrants by thousands rave been hurrying eincc 
December, 1848, resulting in the settlement of California and iu admission mto the Union in 1850. 



=tJ 




ZACHARY TAYLOR, 

TWELFTH PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES. 

HE immediate ancestors of Gen. Zachary Taylor held rank 
among the first families of Virginia, and were connected 
with those whose names are enviably conspicuous in the 
past history of our country, such as Madison, Lee, Barbour, 
Conway, Gaines, Pendleton, &c. 

His father, Richard Taylor, was a man of singular moral 
and physical courage, and when very young, he traversed the wilderness west 
from Virginia to the Mississippi river, without companion or guide, and after 
various explorations, as far south as Natchez, turned eastward and, fearless of 
all danger and perils, walked back to the old dominion. He was afterward a 
colonel of the Virginia militia, and was highly esteemed in that capacity dur- 
ing the Revolution. 

At the age of thirty-five years he married Sarah Strother, a young lady of 
excellent family, who was fifteen years his junior. Their third child was the 
subject of this memoir, whom they named Zachary, in memory of a maternal 
ancestor. He was born in Orange county, Virginia, on the 24th day of No- 
vember, 1784. 

In 1785, Colonel Taylor emigrated to Kentucky, and settled in Jefferson 
county, about five miles from Louisville, where, among the hardy emigrants, 
and the perils of border life, the childhood of Zachary was passed. The sparse 
population of Kentucky at the period of Zachary's childhood, rendered the sup- 
port of efficient schools impossible, and the care of his early education devolved 
upon his parents. The consequence was, that his early years were more devo- 
ted to observation, and the reception of lessons in physical exploits, than in 
study ; yet this deficiency was afterward compensated by an active and unti- 
ring mind, that mastered every problem presented to it. Young Taylor having 
been trained to agriculture, pursued it perseveringly and industriously ; yet he 
felt an irresistible desire to enter the army, as a life more congenial to his taste, 
for he was really a " chip of the old block," nurtured, as he had been, among 
the alarms and perils that excited and surrounded the hardy emigrants. A 
stepping-stone to the service soon offered. When Aaron Burr's operations at 
the west excited suspicion and alarm, young Taylor, with one or two of his 
brothers, formed a volunteer corps to oppose his supposed treasonable designs. 
Their services were not needed, and Zachary returned to his farm. 

On the death of his brother. Lieutenant Taylor, who was an officer in the 
regular service of the United States, Zachary obtained the vacancy, and re- 
ceived a commission from President Jefferson, May 3, 1808, as first lieutenant 
in the seventh regiment of United States infantry. He was then twenty-four 
years of age, and in possession of a competent fortune, but he chose to relin- 
quish the quiet life of a farmer, and engage in the perilous vocation of a sol- 
dier. He was ordered to report himself to General Wilkinson, then at New 
Orleans, which act nearly cost him his life, by a severe attack of yellow fever 



LIVES OF THE PRESIDENTS. 



101 



Defence of Fort Harrison. — Resigns his commission. — Afterward promoted to colonel. 

During the aggression of England, who had incited the Indian tribes against 
the frontier settlements, General Harrison, then governor of the northwestern 
territory, was ordered to march a competent force into the Indian country. To 
this expedition Lieutenant Taylor was attached, and at the bloody battle of 
Tippecanoe, May 7, 1811, his gallant services won the highest esteem of his 
commander. They were appreciated by President Madison, who soon after 
gave him a captain's commission. 

During the winter active hostilities ceased, and early in the spring of 1812, 
Captain Taylor was placed in command of Fort Harrison, on the Wabash, and 
at this period commences his career as a military commander. Fort Harrison 
was the first object of attack by Tecumseh the Indian chief, and here with but 
fifty men, Captain Taylor displayed great energy, ability, and self-possession, 
when attacked at night by the merciless savages. The whole country rang 
with praises of the achievement and its brave actors, and the president at once 
conferred upon Captain Taylor the rank of major, by brevet. After the close 
of the war, the injustice of government caused him to throw up his commis- 
sion and quit the service ; and he retired to his family, and re-engaged in agri- 
cultural pursuits.* 

The influence of powerful friends, and the knowledge of his great services, 
resulted in his being reinstated in the course of the year 1815, by President 
Madison, and in 1816, he was again called from the bosom of his family to en- 
dure the privations of the camp. He was ordered to Green Bay, at which port 
he remained in command four years. In 1819, he was promoted to the rank of 
lieutenant-colonel. From that period until 1832, he was in the constant ser- 
vice of his country on the western and northwestern frontiers, except during 
temporary absences, on account of the illness of his wife. In 1822, he erected 
Fort Jesup, and opened a military road to that port. In 1824, he was ordered 
to Washington, and was made one of a board of commissioners for planning 
and erecting Jefferson Barracks. In 1826, he was one of a board of officers of 
the army and militia (of which General Scott was president), appointed to con- 
sider and submit to the secretary of war, a system for the organization of the 
militia of the United States. Soon after the adjournment of the board, he re- 
sumed his duties on the northwestern frontier, but without occasion to meet 
a foe in combat. 

In 1832, Taylor received a commission from President Jackson, appointing 
him colonel, and in this capacity his skill and bravery were distinguished in 
the border war known as the Black Hawk war. Taylor was soon after ordered 
to Prairie du Chien, to the command of Fort Crawford, a fortress built under 
his superintendence. There he remained until 1836, when government ordered 
him to Florida, to assist in reducing the Seminole Indians to submission. 

The war with the Seminoles began in 1835, and when Colonel Taylor 
reached Florida, it had been prosecuted with indifferent success. General Jes- 
up then had command in Florida, and had made fruitless attempts to bring the 
war to a close. All friendly conferences with the chiefs having failed, it was 
determined, in the autumn of 1837, to take more active measures against the 
Indians. Unlimited scope was given to Colonel Taylor to capture or destroy 

* Many promotions made during the war were annulled at its close ; and in this sweeping' depre- 
ciation, Major Taylor was not overlooked. He was again reduced to the lank of captain, whicb 
indi°:nity he could not brook. 



102 



LIVES OF THE PRESIDENTS. 



Battle of Okeecho-bee. — Victories in Mexico. — Elected president of the United States. 

the savages wherever they might be found. The first battle took place in a 
cypress swamp, which lasted for more than an hour, when the savages were 
driven from their position, to their camp on the border of Lake Okee-cho-bee. 
Finding themselves hotly pursued, and likely to be overcome, the Indians fired 
one volley of rifle balls and fled, closely pursued by the regulars and volun- 
teers until night closed in. This battle of Okee-cho-bee, will ever be memo- 
rable in our annals of Indian wars, as one of the most remarkable for bravery 
and skill on both sides. The loss of the Indians could not be ascertained, 
but it was known to be great, while our own loss amounted to fourteen oflS- 
cers, and one hundred and twenty-four privates, killed and wounded — about 
one fifih of the whole number of white troops engaged. 

Colonel Taylor was highly complimented by the secretary of war ; received 
the thanks of the president of the United States, oflScially communicated by 
General Macomb, then commander-in-chief of the army of the United States; 
and was soon after promoted to the rank of brigadier-general by brevet, for 
" distinguished s-^rvices in the battle of Okee-cho-bee, in Florida." 

Soon after his promotion, in 1838, he was honored with the command of the 
troops in Florida, General Jesup having been recalled at his own request. For 
two years more he toiled on amid the morasses and fevers of that region, fre- 
quently skirmishing with the Indians, but quite unable entirely to " conquer a 
peace." At his own request, he was relieved from the command, and was suc- 
ceeded by General Armistead in April, J 840. He was appointed in a short 
time to the command of the first department of the United States army in the 
southwest. This department included the four slates at the extreme south- 
western part of the Union, Alabama, Mississippi, Arkansas, and Louisiana. 
He made his headquarters at Fort Jesup, uniil 1841, when he was ordered to 
Fort Gibson to relieve General Arbuckle, where he remained nearly five years, 
constantly engaged in the disciplining of the troops, and other services per- 
taining to his station. 

The annexation of Texas to the United States, in March, 1845, having giv- 
en oflTence to Mexico, General Taylor received early in the same month, an 
order from the secretary of war, to place all the forces then under his com- 
mand, or that should thereafter be put under his control, in the most eligible 
position for the defence of Texas, if necessary. Mexico taking umbrage at the 
acts of the United States government — war ensued. Intrusted with the then 
chief command of the army of occupation, General Taylor displayed great tact 
and skill as a commander in the battles afterward fought at Resaca de la Palma, 
May 9th, Monterey, September 21st and 23d, 1846, and Buena Vista, Febru- 
ary'22d and 23d, 1847. After a few off'ensive and defensive movements in the 
vicinity of the battle-groundof Buena Vista, General Taylor returned to his camp 
at Walnut Springs, where he remained quite inactive until December, 1847, 
when he returned home. At New Orleans, and other places on his route to 
his family at .Baton Rouge, Louisiana, he was received with the most enthu- 
siastic demonstrations of respect and admiration. After the brilliant achieve- 
ments at Monterey and Buena Vista, so strongly did admiration for the skill, 
wisdom, and bravery of General Taylor, take possession of the minds of his 
countrymen, that a spontaneous desire seemed to have been awakened in every 
section of the Union to reward him by making him president of the republic, 
the honor of whose arms he had so nobly sustained. He was accordingly 
nominated for that office by the Whig convention on the 7th of June, 1848, 
and in November following, was elected to the chief magistracy. The oppo- 
sing candidates were Gen. Cass (democrat), and Van Buren (free soil). Gen. 
Taylor was inaugurated on the 5th of March, 1849, and occupied the presi- 
dential chair for sixteen months. He was removed by death on the 9th of 
July, 1850, after an illness of only four days. 

In person, General Taylor was about the middle height, slightly inclined to 
corpulency. Benevolence was a striking characteristic of his countenance, 
and ia this respect his face was the true index of his heart. 



MILLARD FILLMORE, 

THIRTEENTH PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES. 



Thb career of Mr. Fillmore affords a striking exhibition of the power of persevering indas- 
tiy, when connected with good natural talents, to overcome everj' obstacle which bumble birth 
and defective education may cast in the way to honor and distinction ; and it is another, of the 
thousandsof examples which our republic affords, proving that that great highway is open to all. 

Millard Fillmore is the son of a New York farmer, who, we believe, is still living. He 
was born at Summer Hill, Cayuga county, New York, January 7, 1800, and is consequently 
now in the fifty-second year of his age. Heavy losses reduced the fortune of his father, when 
Millard was a boy, and his narrow means deprived his son of the advantages of education be- 
yond the common school of the town ; and, at the age of fifteen years, his acquaintance with 
books was confined to those of the schoolroom and the family Bible. At that age, he was sent 
into the wilds of Livingston county to learn the clothier's trade, where he remained only about 
four months, and then returned to his native town. There he pursued the business, under an- 
other man. A small village libraiy was soon formed, and the opening of this little fountain of 
knowledge created an intense thirst for information in the mind of young Fillmore. Every 
leisure moment was spent in reading, and the natural talents of the boy were rapidly developed. 
These were perceived by Judge Wood, a gentleman eminent for his talents and wealth, who 
furnished young Fillmore with the means of purchasing his time ; and then, at the age of nine- 
teen, he took him into his office as a law-student. There he remained two years, teaching 
Bchool three months out of each year, to acquire the means for his partial support. In 1821, he 
entered a law-office in Buffalo, and taught school and studied until the spring of 1823, when he 
was admitted to the bar, and commenced practice in Aurora. There he remained until 1830, 
when he returned to Buffalo, where he resided until elevated to the Presidency in 1850. 

Mr. Fillmore's first entrance into public life was in 1829, when he took his seat as a member 
of assembly for Erie county, which office he filled for two years in succession. The whigs 
(with whom he acted) were then in an almost helpless minority, and Fillmore had httle chance 
to distinguish himself Yet, notwithstanding his youth, his talents obtained for him great influ- 
ence with his party, and it was a common remark among the whig members — " If Fillmore 
says it is right, we will vote for it." In the legislature he took an active stand for humanity, 
in favor of abolishing imprisonment for debt, and was one of the committee who draughted the 
bill for that purpose. 

In 1832, Mr. Fillmore was elected a representative of his district in Congress ; and during 
the stormy session of 1833-34, when the United States bank and the " removal of the deposites" 
were the great theme of debate, he was untiring in his labors. He resumed the practice of his 
profession at the close of the term, but was again called forth, in 1836, to represent his district 
m Congress the second time. He now took a more active part, and was placed upon many 
important committees, among which was the one on elections. It was before this committee 
that the famous New Jersey ca;se came up, and in the patient and able investigation of 
that case Mr. Fillmore greatly distinguished himself. He was re-elected to Congress in 1840, 
by a majority larger than ever before given in his district, and in that session he was recog- 
nised as a leader in the house. He remained in Congress, laboring intensely for the public 
good, until 1844, when he received from his party the nomination for the oflSce of governor of 
tlie state of New York. The late Silas Wright was his successful competitor. In the antunm 
of 1847, Mr. Fillmore was elected comptroller of the state of New York, by the overwhelming 
majority of forty tliousand, which ofiBce he filled with signal ability. He was elected Vice 
President of the United States in November, 1848, and entered upon the duties of the office on 
the 4th of March following. For his dignity and impartiality as president of the Senate, he re- 
ceived the sincere acknowledgments of men of all parlies, and won their highest esteem. On 
the death of President Taylor in July, 1850, Mr. Fillmore was called by the constitution from 
the chair of the Senate to that of the chief magistracy of the nation. It was at a time when 
justice, impartiality, and firmness, were essential requisites in the character of the Executive, 
for questions of great moment, involving the perpetuity of our Union, were then agitating the 
national council and disturbing the repose of the whole people. Mr. Fillmore possesses these 
requisites in an eminent degree, and honors the exalted ofiice by his wisdom and integrity. 

In person, Mr. Fillmore is above the common size. His dignity of demeanor repels nndoe 
familiarity, yet bis urbanity and habitual courtesy<make the most humble feel at ease in his 
presence. 



THE DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE, 

OF TIM! 

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. 

ADOPTED JULY 4th, 1776. 



Wheit, in Ihe course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve 
the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the 
powers of the earth the separate and equal station to which the laws of nature and of 
nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that the!/ 
should declare the causes which impel them to the separation. 

We hold these truths to be self-evident — that all men are created equal; that they 
are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights; that among these are life, 
liberty, and the pursuit of happiness: that to secure these rights, governments are insti- 
tuted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed; that 
whenever any form of government becomes destructive to these ends, it is the right of 
the people to alter or abolish it, and to institute a new government, laying its foundation 
on such principles, and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most 
likely to effect their safety and happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that govern- 
ments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and, accord- 
ingly, all experience hath shown that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils 
are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accus- 
tomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same 
object, evinces a design to reduce them under absolute despotism, it is their right, it is their 
duty, to throw off such government, and to provide new guards for their future security. 
Such has been the patient sufferance of these colonies; and such is now the necessity 
which constrains them to alter their former systems of government. The history of the 
present king of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having 
in direct object the establishment of an absolute tyranny over these states. To prove 
this, let facts be submitted to a candid world : — 

He has refused his assent to laws the most wholesome and necessary for the public 
good. 

He has forbidden his governors to pass laws of immediate and pressing importance un- 
less suspended in their operations till his assent should be obtained; and, when so sus- 
pended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them. 

He has refused to pass other laws, for the accommodation of large districts of people, 
unless those people would relinquish the right of representation in the legislature — a 
compliance right inestimable to them, and formidable to tyrants only. 

He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant 
from the depository of their public records, for the sole purpose, of fatiguing them into 
with his measures. 

He has dissolved representative houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness 
his invasions on the rights of the people. 

He has refused, for a long time after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected ; 
whereby the legislative powers, incapable of annihilation, have returned to the people at 
iarge, for their exercise ; the state remaining, in the meantime, exposed to all the danger 
of invasion from without and convulsions within. 

He has endeavored to prevent the population of these states : for that purpose obstruct- 
ing the laws ftir the naturalization of foreigners, refusing to pass others to encourage 
their migration hither, and raising the condition of new appropriations of lands. 

He has obstructed the administration of justice, by refusing his assent to laws for estab- 
lishing judiciary powers. 



106 APPENDIX. 



He has made judges dependent on his will alone for the tenure of their offices, and the 
amount and payment of their salaries. 

He has erected a multitude of new offices, and sent hither swarms of officers, to harass 
our population and cat out their substance. 

He has kept among us, in time of peace, standing armies, without the consent of our 
legislature. 

He has affected to render the military independent of, and superior to, the civil power. 

He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, 
and unacknowledged by our laws, giving his assent to their acts of pretended legisla- 
tion — 

For quartering large bodies of armed troops among us: For protecting them, by a 
mock trial, from punishment for any murders which they should commit on the inhabi- 
tants of these states: For cutting off our trade with all parts of the world : For imposing 
taxes on us without our consent : For depriving us, in many cases, of the benefits of 
trial by jury: For transporting us beyond seas, to be tried for pretended offences: 
For abolishing the free system of English laws in a neighboring province, establishing 
therein an arbitrary government, and enlarging its boundaries, so as to render it at once 
an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule into these colonies : 
For taking away our charters, abolishing our most valuable laws, and altering funda- 
mentally the forms of our government: For suspending our own legislatures, and declar- 
ing themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever. 

He has abdicated government here, by declaring us out of his protection, and waging 
war against us. 

He has plundered our seas, ravaged our coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the 
lives of our people. 

He is, at this time, transporting large armies of foreign mercenaries, to complete the 
Works of death, desolation, and tyranny, already begun, with circumstances of cruelty 
and perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the 
head of a civilized nation. 

He has constrained our fellow-citizens, taken captive on the high seas, to bear arms 
against their country, to become the executioners of their friends and brethren, or fall 
themselves by their hands. 

He has excited domestic insurrection among us, and has endeavored to bring on the 
inhabitants of our frontiers the merciless Indian savages, whose known rule of warfare 
is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes, and conditions. 

In every stage of these oppressions we have petitioned for redress in the most humble 
terms : our repeated petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A prince 
whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a tyrant, is unfit to be 
the ruler of a free people. 

Nor have we been wanting in attention to our British brethren. We have warned 
them, from time to time, of attempts made by their legislature to extend an unwarranta- 
ble jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration 
and settlement here. We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and 
we have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred, to disavow these usurpations 
which would inevitably interrupt our connexion and correspondence. 1'hey, too, have 
been deaf to the voice of justice and consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in 
the necessity which denounces our separation, and hold them as we hold the rest of 
mankind — enemies in war — in peace, friends. 

We, therefore, the representatives of the United States of America, in general Congress 
assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our inten- 
tions, do, in the name and by the authority of the good people of these colonies, solemn- 
ly publish and declare that these united colonies are, and of right ought to be, free and 
independent states ; that they are absolved from all allegiance to the British crown, and 
that all political connexion between them and the state of Great Britain is, and ought 
to be, totally dissolved: and that, as free and independent states, they have full power 
to levy war, conclude peace, contract alliances, establish commerce, and to do all other 
acts and things which independent states may of right do. And for the support of this 
declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of Divine Providence, we mutually 
pledge to each other our lives, our fortunes, and our sacred honor. 



CONSTITUTION OF THE UNITED STATES, 

COPIED FROM, AND COMPARED WITH, THE ROLL IN THE DEPARTMENT 

OF STATE. 



We, the people of the United States, m order to form a more perfect union, 
establish justice, insure domestic tranquillity, provide for the common de- 
fence, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to 
ourselves and our posteritjsdo ordain and establish this constitution for the 
United States of America : — 

ARTICLE L 
Section 1. All legislative powers herein granted shall be vested in a Con- 
gress of the United States, which shall consist of a senate and house of repre- 
sentatives. 

Section 2. The house of representatives shall be composed of members cho- 
sen every second year by the people of the several states, and the electors ill 
each state shall have the qualifications requisite for electors of the most numer- 
ous branch of thvi state legislature. 

No person shall be a representative who shall not have attained to the age of 
tv/enty-five years, and been seven years a citizen of the United States, and who 
shall not, when elected, be an inhabitant of that state in which he shall be 
chosen- 
Representatives and direct taxes shall be apportioned among the several 
states which may be included Avithin this Union, according to their respective 
numbers, which shall be determined by adding to the whole number of free 
persons, including those bound to service for a term of years, and excludin^ 
Indians not taxed, three fifths of all othfr persons. The actual enumeration 
shall be made within three years after the first meeting of the Congress of the 
United States, and within every subsequent term of ten years, in such manner 
as they shall by law direct. The number of representatives shall not exceed 
one for every thirty thousand, but each state shall have at least one representa- 
tive ; and until such enumeration shall be made, the state of New Hampshire 
shall be entitled to choose three, Massachusetts eight, Rhode Island and Provi- 
dence Plantations one, Connecticut five. New York six. New Jersey four, Penn- 
sylvania eight, Delaware one, Maryland six, Virginia ten, North Carolina five. 
South Carolina five, and Georgia three. 

When vacancies happen in the representation from any state, the executive 
authority thereof shall issue writs of election to fill such vacancies. 

The house of representatives shall choose their speaker and other oflScers ; 
and shall have the sole power of impeachment. 



108 APPENDIX. 



Section 3. The senate of the United States shall be composed of two sena* 
tors from each state, chosen by the legislature thereof, for six years ; and each 
senator shall have one vote. 

Immediately after they shall be assembled in consequence of the first elec- 
tion, they shall be divided as equally as may be into three classes. The seats 
of the senators of the first class shall be vacated at the expiration of the secon'l 
year, of the second class at the expiration of the fourth year, and of the third 
class at the expiration of the sixth year, so that one third may be chosen every 
second year ; and if vacancies happen by resignation, or otherwise, during the 
recess of the legislature of any state, the executive thereof may make tempo- 
rary appointments imtil the next meeting of the legislature, which shall then 
fill such vacancies. 

No person shall be a senator who shall not have attained to the age of thirty 
years, and been nine years a citizen of the United States, and who shall not, 
v/hen elected, be an inhabitant of that state for which he shall be chosen. 

The vice-president of the United States shall be president of the senate, but 
shall have no vote, unless they be equally divided. 

The senate shall choose their other officers, and also a president pro tempore, 
in the absence of the vice-president, or when. he shall exercise the office of 
president of the United States. 

The senate shall have the sole power to try all impeachments : When sit- 
ting for that purpose, they shall be on oath or affirmation. When the presi- 
dent of the United States is tried, the chief-justice shall preside : And no per- 
son shall be convicted without the concurrence of two thirds of the members 
present. 

Judgment in cases of impeachment shall not extend further than to removal 
from office, and disqualification to hold and enjoy any office of honor, trust, or 
profit, under the United States : but the party convicted shall nevertheless be 
liable and subject to indictment, trial, judgment, and punishment, according 
to law. 

Section 4. The times, places, and maimer of holding elections for senators 
and representatives, shall be prescribed in each state by the legislature thereof; 
but the Congress may at any time by law make or alter such regulations, ex- 
cept as to the places of choosing senators. 

The Congress shall assemble at least once in every year, and such meeting 
shall be on the first Monday in Decemfcer, unless they shall by law appoint a 
difi'erent day. 

Section 5. Each house shall be the judge of the elections, returns, and qual- 
ifications, of its own members, and a majority of each shall constitute a quorum 
to do business ; but a smaller number may adjourn from day to day, and may 
be authorized to compel the attendance of absent members, in such manner, 
and under such penalties, as each house may provide. 

Each house may determine the rules of its proceedings, punish its members 
for disorderly behavior, and, with the concurrence of two thirds, expel a 
member. 

Each house shall keep a journal of its proceedings, and from time to time pub- 
lish the same, excepting such parts as may in their judgment require secrecy ; 
and the yeas and nays of the members of either house on any question shall, at 
the desire of one fifth of those present, be entered on the journal. 



\k 



CONSTITUTION OF THE UNITED STATES. 



109 



Neither house, during the session of Congress, shall, without the consent of 
the other, adjourn for more than three days, nor to any other place than that in 
which the two houses shall be sitting. 

Section 6. The senators and representatives shall receive a compensation 
for their services, to be ascertained by law, and paid out of the treasury of the 
United States. They shall in all cases, except treason, felony, and breach of 
the peace, be privileged from arrest during their attendance at the session of 
their respective houses, and in going to and returning from the same ; and for any 
speech or debate in either house, they shall not be questioned in any other place. 

No senator or representative shall, during the time for which he was elected, 
be appointed to any civil office under the authority of the United States, which 
shall have been created, or the emoluments whereof shall have been increased 
during such time ; and no person holding any office under the United States 
shall be a member of either house during his continuance in office. 

Section 7. All bills for raising revenue shall originate in the house of rep- 
resentatives ; but the senate may propose or concur with amendments as on 
other bills. 

Every bill which shall have passed the house of representatives and the sen- 
ate, shall, before it become a law, be presented to the president of the United 
States: if he approve he shall sign it, but if not he shall return it, with his ob- 
jections, to that house in which it shall have originated, who shall enter the 
objections at large on their journal, and proceed to reconsider it. If, after such 
reconsideration, two thirds of that house shall agree to pass the bill, it shall be 
sent, together with the objections, to the other house, by which it shall like- 
wise be reconsidered, and if approved by two thirds of that house it shall be- 
come a law. But in all such cases the voles of both houses shall be determined 
by yeas and nays, and the names of the persons voting for and against the bill, 
shall be entered on the journal of each house respectively. If any bill shall not 
be returned by the president within ten days (Sundays excepted) after it shall 
have been presented to him, the same shall be a law, in like manner as if he had 
signed it, unless the Congress by their adjournment prevent its return, in which 
case it shall not be a law. 

Every order, resolution, or vote, to which the concurrence of the senate and 
house of representatives may be necessary (except on a question of adjourn- 
ment), shall be presented to the president of the United States ; and before the 
same shall take effect, shall be approved by him, or, being disapproved by him, 
shall be repassed by two thirds of the senate and house of representatives, ac- 
cording to the rules and limitations prescribed in the case of a bill. 

Section 8. The Congress shall have power to lay and collect taxes, duties, 
imposts, and excises, to pay the debts and provide for the common defence and 
general welfare of the United States ; but all duties, imposts, and excises, shall 
be imiform throughout the United States ; 

To borrow money on the credit of the United States ; ^ 

To regulate commerce with forfeign nations, and among the several states, 
and with the Indian tribes ; 

To establish a uniform rule of naturalization, and uniform laws on the sub- 
ject of bankruptcies throughout the United States ; 

To coin money, regulate the value thereof, and of foreign coin, and fix the 
standard of weights and measures. 



110 APPENDIX. 



To provide for the punishment of counterfeiting the securities and current 
coin of the United States ; 

To establish postoffices and postroads ; 

To promote the progress of science and useful arts, by securing for limited 
times to authors and inventors the exclusive right to their respective Tvritings 
and discoveries; 
To constitute tribunals inferior to the supreme court ; 

To define and punish piracies and felonies committed en the high seas, and 
offences against the law of nations ; 

To declare war, grant letters of marque and reprisal, and make rules con- 
cerning captures on land and water ; 

To raise and support armies, but no appropriation of money to that use shall 
be for a longer term than two years ; 
To provide and maintain a navy ; 

To make rules for the government and regulation of the land and naval forces ; 
To provide for calling forth the militia to execute the laws of the Union, sup- 
press insurrections, and repel invasions ; 

To provide for organizing, arming, and disciplining, the militia, and for gov- 
erning such part of them as may be employed in the service of the United States, 
reserving to the states respectively the appointment of the officers, and the au- 
thority of training the militia according to the discipline prescribed by Con- 
gress ; 

To exercise exclusive legislation in all cases whatsoever over such district 
Cnot exceeding ten miles square) as may, by cession of particular states, and 
the acceptance of Congress, become the seat of the government of the United 
Slates, and to exercise like authority over all places purchased by the consent 
of the legislature of the state in which the same shall be, for the erection of 
forts, magazines, arsenals, dockyards, and other needful buildings ; — and 

To make all laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into ex« 
ecution the foregoing powers, and all other powers vested by this constitution 
in the government of the United States, or in any department or officer thereof. 
Section 9. The migration or importation of such persons as any of the states 
now existing shall think proper to admit, shall not be prohibited by the Con- 
gress prior to the year one thousand eight hundred and eight, but a tax or duty 
may be imposed on such importation, not exceeding ten dollars for each person. 
The privilege of the writ of habeas corpus shall not be suspended, unless 
when in cases of rebellion or invasion the public safety may require it. 
No bill of attainder or ex post facto law shall be passed. 
No capitation or other direct tax shall be laid, unless in proportion to the 
census or enumeration hereinbefore directed to be taken. 

No tax or duty shall be laid on articles exported from any state. 
No preference shall be given by any regulation of commerce or revenue to 
the ports of one state over those of another : nor shall vessels bound to or from 
one state, be obliged to enter, clear, or pay duties, in another. 

No money shall be drawn from the treasury, but in consequence of appropri- 
ations made by law ; and a regular statement and account of the receipts and 
ex])eaditures of all public money shall be published from time to time. 

No title of nobility shall be granted by the United States; and no person 
holding any office of profit or trust under them shall, without the consent of the 



CONSTITUTION OF THE UNITED STATES. nx 



Congress, accept of any present, emolument, office, or title, of any kind what- 
ever, from any king, prince, or foreign state. 

Section 10. No state shall enter into any treaty, alliance, or confederation 
grant letters of marque and reprisal ; coin money ; emit bills of credit ; make 
anything but gold and silver coin a tender in payment of debts; pass any bill 
of attainder, ex post facto law, ^r law impairing the obligation of contracts, or 
grant any title of nobility. 

No state shall, without the consent of the Congress, lay any imposts or du- 
ties on imports or exports, except what may be absolutely necessary for execu- 
ting its inspection-laws: and the net produce of all duties and imposts, laid by 
any state on imports or exports, shall be for the use of the treasury of the Uni- 
ted States ; and all such laws shall be subject to the revision and control of the 
Congress. 

No stale shall, without the consent of Congress, lay any duty of tonnage, 
keep troops or ships-of- war in time of peace, enter into any agreement or com- 
pact with another state, or with a foreign power, or engage in war, unless ac- 
tually invaded, or in such imminent danger as will not admit of delay. 

ARTICLE II. 

Section 1. The executive power shall be vested in a president of the United 
States of America. He shall hold his office during the term of four years, and, 
together with the vice-president, chosen for the same term, be elected as fol- 
lows : — 

Each state shall appoint, in such manner as the legislature thereof may di- 
rect, a number of electors equal to the whole number of senators and represen- 
tatives to which the state may be entitled in the Congress : but no senator or 
representative, or person holding an office of trust or profit under the United 
States, shall be appointed an elector. 

[The electors, shall meet in their respective states, and vote by ballot for two 
persons, of whom one at least shall not be an inhaj)itant of the. same state with 
themselves. And they shall make a list of all the persons voted for, and of the 
number of votes for each ; which list they shall sign and certify, and transmit 
sealed to the seat of the government of the United States, directed to the presi- 
dent of the senate- The president of the senate shall, in the presence of the 
senate and house of representatives, open all the certificates, and the votes shall 
then be counted. The person having the greatest number of votes shall be the 
president, if such number be a majority of the whole number of electors ap- 
pointed ; and if there be more than one who have such majority, and have an 
equal number of votes, then the house of representatives shall immediately 
choose by ballot one of them for president ; and if no person have a majority, 
then from the five highest on the list the said house shall in like manner choose 
the president. But in choosing the president, the votes shall be taken by states, 
the representation from each state having one vote ; a quorum for this purpose 
shall consist of a member or members from two thirds of the states, and a ma- 
jority of all the states shall be necessary to a choice. In every case, after the 
choice of the president, the person having the greatest number of votes of the 
eleclors shall be the vice-president. But if there should remain two or more 
who have equal votes, the senate shall choose from them by ballot the vice- 
president.*] 

The Congress may determine the time of choosing the electors, and the day 
on which they shall give their votes ; which day shall be the same throughout 
the United States. 

• This clansa is annoDed. See amendments, article xii 



112 APPENDIX. 



No person except a natural-born citizen, or a citizen of the United States at 
the time of the adoption of this constitution, shall be eligible to the office of 
president ; neither shall any person be eligible to that office who shall not have 
attained to the age of thirty-five years, and been fourteen years a resident with- 
in the United States. 

In case of the removal of the president ^rom office, or of his death, resigna- 
tion, or inability to discharge the powers and duties of the said office, the same 
shall devolve on the vice-president, and the Congress may by law provide for 
the case of removal, death, resignation, or inability, both of the president and 
vice-president, declaring what officer shall then act as president, and such offi- 
cer shall act accordingly, until the disability be removed, or a president shall be 
elected. 

The president shall, at stated times, receive for his services a compensation, 
which shall neither be increased nor diminished during the period for which he 
shall have been elected, and he shall not receive wi'bin luai period any other 
emolument from the United States, or any of them. 

Before he enter on the execution of his office, he shall take the following oath 
or affirmation : " I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will faithfully execute 
the office of president of the United States, and will, to the best of my ability, 
preserve, protect, and defend, the constitution of the United States." 

Section 2. The president shall be commander-in-chief of the army and navy 
of the United States, and of the militia of the several states, when called into 
the actual service of the United States ; he may require the opinion, in writing, 
of the principal officer in each of the executive departments, upon any subject 
relating to the duties of their respective offices, and he shall have power to 
grant reprieves and pardons for offences against the United States, except in 
cases of impeachment. 

He shall have power, by and with the advice and consent of the senate, to 
make treaties, provided two thirds of the senators present concur ; and he shall 
nominate, and, by and with the advice and consent of the senate, shall appoint 
embassadors, other public ministers, and consuls, judges of the supreme court, 
and all other officers of the United States, whose appointments are not herein 
otherwise provided for, and which shall be established by law ; but the Congress 
may by law vest the appointment of such inferior officers as they think proper 
in the president alone, in the courts of law, or in the heads of departments. 

The president shall have power to fill up all vacancies that may happen du- 
ring the recess of the senate, by granting commissions which shall expire at 
the end of their next session. 

Section 3. He shall from time to time give to the Congress information of 
the state of the Union, and recommend to their consideration such measures as 
he shall judge necessary and expedient ; he may, on extraordinary occasions, 
convene both houses, or either of them, and in case of disagreement between 
ihem, with respect to the time of adjournment, he may adjourn them to such 
time as he shall think proper ; he sliall receive embassadors and other public 
ministers ; he shall take care that the laAvs be faithfully executed, and shall 
commission all the officers of the United States. 

Section 4. The president, vice-president, and all civil officers of the United 
States, shall be removed from office on impeachment for, and conviction of 
treason, bribery, or other high crimes and iLiisdemeanors. 



CONSTITUIION OF THE UNITED STATES. 



113 



ARTICLE III. 

Section 1. The judicial power of the United States shall be vested in one 
supreme court, and in such inferior courts as the Congress may from time to 
time ordain and establ' .h. The judges, both of the supreme and inferior courts, 
shall hold their ofBceF du'-ing good behavior, and shall, at stated times, receive 
for their services a co^pcisation which shall not be diminished during their 
continuance in office. 

Section 2. The judicial power shall extend to all cases, in law and equity, 
arising under this constitution, the laws of the United States, and treaties made, 
or which shall be made, under their authority ; to all cases affecting embassa« 
dors, other public ministers, and consuls ; to all cases of admiralty and mari- 
time jurisdiction ; to controversies to which the United States shall be a party ; 
to controversies between two or more states ; between a state and citizens of 
another state ; between citizens of different states ; between citizens of the same 
state claiming lands under grants of different states ; and between a state, or the 
citizens thereof, and foreign states, citizens, or subjects. 

In all cases affecting embassadors, other public ministers, and consuls, and 
those m which a state shall be party, the supreme court shall have original ju- 
risdiction. In all the other cases before mentioned, the supreme court" shall 
have appellate jurisdiction, both as to law and fact, with such exceptions and 
under such regulations as the Congress shall make. 

The trial of all crimes, except in cases of impeachment, shall be by jury ; and 
such trial shall be held in the state where the said crimes shall have been com- 
mitted ; but when not committed within any state, the trial shall be at such 
place or places as the Congress may by law have directed. 

Section 3. Treason against the United States shall consist only in levying 
war against them, or in adhermg to their enemies, giving them aid and com- 
fort. 

No person shall be convicted of treason imless on the testimony of two wit- 
nesses to the same overt act, or on confession in open court. 

The Congress shall have power to declare the punishment of treason, but no 
attainder of treason shall work corruption of blood, or forfeiture, except during 
the life of the person attainted. 

ARTICLE IV. 

Section 1. Full faith and credit shall be given m each state to the public 
acts, records, and judicial proceedings, of every other state. And the Congress 
may by general laws prescribe the manner in which such acts, records, and 
proceedings, shall be proved, and the effect thereof. 

Section 2. The citizens of each state shall be entitled to all privileges and 
immunities of citizens in the several states. 

A person charged in any state with treason, felony, or other crime, who shall 
flee from justice, and be found in another state, shall, on demand of the execu- 
tive authority of the state from which he fled, be delivered up, to be removed 
to the state having jurisdiction of the crime. 

No person held to service or labor in one state, under the laws thereof, esca- 
ping into another, shall, m consequence of any law or regulation therein, be 
discharged from such service or labor, but shall be delivered up on claim of the 
party to whom such service or labor may be due. 

8 



114 APPENPIX. 



Section 3. New states may be admitted by the Congress into this Union ; 
but no new state shall be formed or erected within the jurisdiction of any other 
state ; nor any state be formed by the junction of two or more states, or parts 
of states, without the consent of the legislatures of the states concerned as well 
as of the Congress. 

The Congress shall have power to dispose of and make all needful rules and 
regulations respecting the territory or other property belonging to the United 
States ; and nothiug in this constitution shall be so construed as to prejudice 
any claims of the United States or of any particular state. 

Section 4. The United States shall guaranty to every state in this Union a 
reptsbJican form of government, and shall protect each of them against inva- 
sion ; and, on application of the legislature, or of the executive (when the legis- 
lature can not be convened), against domestic violence. 

ARTICLE V. 

The Congress, whenever two thirds of both houses shall deem it necessary 
shall propose amendments to this constitution, or, on the application of the 
legislatures of two thirds of the several states, shall call a convention for pro- 
posing amendments, which, in either case, shall be valid to all intents and pur- 
poses, as part of this constitution, when ratified by the legislatures of three 
fourths of the several states, or by conventions in three fourths thereof, as the 
one or the other mode of ratification may be proposed or the Congress ; provided 
that no amendment which may be made prior to the year one thousand eight 
hundred and eight shall in any manner affect the first and fourth clauses in the 
ninth section of the first article ; and that no state, without its consent, shall be 
deprived of its equal suffrage in the senate. 

ARTICLE VL 

All debts contracted, and engagements entered into, before tne adoption of 
this constitution, shall be as valid against the United States under this constitu- 
tion as under the confederation. 

This constitution, and the laws of the United States which shall be made m 
pursuance thereof, and all treaties made, or which shall be made, under the au- 
thority of the United States, shall be the supreme law of the land ; and the 
judges in every state shall be bound thereby, anything in the constitution or 
laws of any state to the contrary notwithstanding. 

The senators and representatives before mentioned, and the members of the 
several state legislatures, and all executive and judicial officers, both of the 
United States and of the several states, shall be bound by oath or affirmation to 
support this constitution, but no religious test shall ever be required as a quali- 
fication to any office or public trust under the United Stsftes. 

ARTICLE VIL 

The ratification of the conventions of nine states shall be sufficient for 
the establishment of this constitution between the states so ratifying the 
same. 

Done in convention, by the unanimous consent of the states present, the 
seventh day of September, in the year of our Lord one thousand seven 



CONSTITUTION OF THE UNITED STATES. 



115 



hundred and eighty-seven, and of the independence of the United States of 
America the twelfth. In witness whereof we have hereunto subscribed 
our names. ^ 



NEW HAMPSHIRE. 
John Langdon, 
Nicholas Gilman. 

MASSACHUSETTS. 
Nathaniel Gorham, 
RuFUs King. 

CONNECTICUT. 
William SABniEL Johnson, 
Roger Sherman. 

NEW YORK. 
Alexander Hamilton. 

NEW JERSEY. 
William Livingston, 
David Brearlet, 
William Paterson, 
Jonathan Datton. 

PENNSYLVANIA. 
Benjamin Franklin, 
Thomas Mifflin, 
Robert Morris, 
George Clymer, 
Thomas Fitzsimons, 
Jared Ingersoll, 
James Wilson, 
Gouverneur Morris. 

Attest : 



GEORGE WASHINGTON, 

President, and deputy from Virginia. 

DELAWARE. 
George Reed, 
Gunning Bedford, jr., 
John Dickinson, 
Richard Bassett, 
Jacob Broom. 

MARYLAND. 
James M'Henrt, 
Daniel (of St. ThoxMas) Jenifeu, 
Daniel Carroll. 

VIRGINIA. 
John Blair, t 

James Madison, jr. 

NORTH CAROLINA. 
William Blount, 
Richard Dobbs Spaight, 
Hugh Williamson. 

SOUTH CAROLINA. 
John Rutledge, 
Charles C. Pincknet, 
Charles Pincknet, 
Pierce Butler. 

GEORGIA, 
William Few, 
Abraham Baldwin. 

William Jackson, Secretary, 




AMENDMENTS* 

TO THE CONSTITUTION OF THE UNITED STATES, RATIFIED ACCORDING TO THE PBO- 
VISIONS OF THE FIFTH ARTICLE OF THE FOREGOING CONSTITUTION. 



1 



Article the first. Congress shall make no law respecting an establish- 
ment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the free- 
dom of speech, or of the press ; or the right of the people peaceably to assem- 
ble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances. 

Article the second. A well-regulated militia being necessary to the se- 
curity of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be 
mfringe^. 

Article the third. No soldier shall, in time of peace, be quartered m any 
house, without the consent of the owner, nor in a time of war, but in a manner 
to be prescribed by laAV. 

Article the fourth. The right of the people to be secure m their persons, 
houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall 
not be violated, and no warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported 
by oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and 
the persons or things to be seized. 

Article the fifth. No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or oth- 
erwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a grand jury, 
except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the militia, when in 
actual service in time of war or public danger ; nor shall any person be subject 
for the same offence to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb ; nor shall be 
compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself, nor be deprived 
of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law ; nor shall private prop- 
erty be taken for public use, without just compensation. 

Article the sixth. In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy 
the right to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury of the state and dis- 
trict wherein the crime shall have been committed, which district shall have 
been previously ascertained by law, and to be informed of the nature and cause 
of the accusation ; to be confronted with the witnesses against him ; to have 
compulsory process for obtaining witnesses m his favor, and to have the assist- 
ance of counsel for his defence. 

Article the seventh. In suits at common law, where the value m contro- 
versy shall exceed twenty dollars, the right of trial by jury shall be preserved, 
and no fact tried by a jury shall be otherwise re-examined in any court of the 
United States, than according to the rules of the common law. 

Article the eighth. Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive 
fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted. 

• Congress, at its first session, began and held in the city of New York, on Wednesday, 
the 4th of March, 1789, proposed to the legislatures of the eeveral states twelve amendmenta 
to the constitation, ten of which only were adopted. 



CONSTITUTION OF THE UNITED STATES. H? 

Article the ninth. The enumeration in the constitution, of certain rights, 
shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people. 

Article the tenth. The powers not delegated to the United States by the 
constitution, nor prohibited by it to the states, are reserved to the states respec- 
tively, or to the people. 

Article the eleventh.* The judicial power of the United States shall not 
be construed to extend to any suit in law or equity, commenced or prosecuted 
against one of the United States by citizens of another state, or by citizens or 
subjects of any foreign state. 

Article the twelfth.! The electors shall meet in their respective states, 
and vote by ballot for president and vice-president, one of whom at least shall 
not be an inhabitant of the same state with themselves ; they shall name in 
their ballots the person voted for as president, and in distinct ballots the person 
voted for as vice-president, and they shall make distinct lists of all persons 
voted for as president, and of all persons voted for as vice-president, and of the 
number of votes for each, which lists they shall sign and certify, and transmit 
sealed to the seat of the government of the United States, directed to the presi- 
dent of the senate : the president of the senate shall, in the presence of the sen- 
ate and house of representatives, open all the certificates, and the votes shall 
then be counted ; the person having the greatest number of votes for president, 
shall be the president, if such number be a majority of the whole number of 
electors appointed ; and if no person have such majority, then from the persona 
having the highest numbers not exceeding three on the list of those voted for 
as president, the house of representatives shall choose immediately, by ballot, 
the president. But in choosing the president, the votes shall be taken by states, 
the representation from each state having one vote ; a quorum for this purpose 
shall consist of a member or members from two thirds of the states, and a ma- 
jority of all the states shall be necessary to a choice. And if the house of rep- 
resentatives shall not choose a president whenever the right of choice shall de- 
volve upon them, before the fourth day of March next following, then the vice- 
president shall act as president, as in the case of the death or other constitu- 
tional disability of the president. The person having the greatest number of votes 
as vice-president, shall be the vice-president, if such number be a majority of 
the whole number of electors appointed, and if no person have a majority, then 
from the two highest numbers on the list the senate shall choose the vice-presi- 
dent : a quorum for the purpose shall consist of two thirds of the whole number 
of senators, and a majority of the whole number shall be necessary to a choice. 
But no person constitutionally ineligible to the office of president shall be eligi- 
ble to that of vice-president of the United States. 

Note. — Another amendment was proposed as article xiii., at the second session of the elev- 
enth Congress, hut not having been ratified by a sufiicient number of states, has not yet become 
valid as a part of the constitution of the United States. It is erroneously given as a part of the 
constitution, in page 74, vol. i., Laws of the United States. 

• This amendment was proposed at the first session of the third Congress. See ante art 
ill., sect. 2, clause 1. 

I Proposed at the first Beesioa of the eighth Congresa. Beo ante art. ii., sect 1, clanse 3 
AiiQulled by this amendment 



WASHINGTON'S FAREWELL ADDRESS. 



Friends and Fellow-Citizens: The period for a new election of a citizen to 
administer the executive government of the United States being not far distant, 
and the time actually arrived when your thoughts must be employed in designa- 
ting the person who is to be clothed with that important trust, it appears to me 
proper, especially as it may conduce to a more distinct expression of the public 
voice, that I should now apprize you of the resolution I have formed to decline 
being considered among the number of those out of whom a choice is to be 
made. I beg you, at the same time, to do me the justice to be assured that 
this resolution has not been taken without a strict regard to all the considera- 
tions appertaining to the relation which binds a dutiful citizen to his country ; 
and that, in withdrawing the tender of service which silence in my situation 
might imply, I am influenced by no diminution of zeal for your future interest, 
no deficiency of grateful respect for your past kindness, but am supported by a 
full conviction that the step is compatible with both. 

The acceptance of and continuance hitherto in the office to which your suf- 
frages have twice called me, have been a uniform sacrifice of inclination to the 
opinion of duty, and to a deference for what appeared to be your desire. I con- 
stantly hoped that it would have been much earlier in my power, consistently 
with motives which I was not at liberty to disregard, to return to that retire- 
ment from which I have been reluctantly drawn. The strength of my inclina- 
tion to do this, previous to the last election, had even led to the preparation of 
an address to declare it to you ; but mature reflection on the then perplexed and 
critical posture of our affairs with foreign nations, and the unanimous advice 
of persons entitled to my confidence, impelled me to abandon the idea. 

I rejoice that the state of your concerns, external as well as internal, no 
longer renders the pursuit of inclination incompatible with the sentiment of 
duty or propriety, and am persuaded, whatever partiality may be retained for 
my services, that in the present circumstances of our country you will not dis- 
approve my determination to retire. 

The impressions with which I first undertook the arduoiis trust were ex- 
plained on the proper occasion. In the discharge of this trust,, I will only say 
that I have with good intentions contributed, toward the organization and ad- 
ministration of the government, the best exertions of which a very fallible 
judgment was capable. Not unconscious, in the outset, of the inferiority of my 
qualifications, experience in my own eyes, perhaps still more in the eyes of 
others, has strengthened the motives to diffidence of myself; and every day the 



\U 



WASHINGTON'S FAREWELL ADDRESS. 119 



increasing weight of years admonishes me more and more that the shade of re- 
tirement is as necessary to me as it will be welcome. Satisfied that if any 
circumstances have given peculiar value to my services, they were temporary, 
I have the consolation to believe, that while choice and prudence mvite me to 
quit the political scene, patriotism does not forbid it. 

In looking forward to the moment which is intended to termmate the career 
of my public life, my feelings do not permit me to suspend the deep acknoAvl- 
edgment of that debt of gratitude which I owe to my beloved country for the 
many honors it has conferred upon me ; still more for the steadfast confidence 
with which it has supported me, and for the opportunities I have thence en- 
joyed of manifesting my inviolable attachment, by services faithful and perse- 
vering, though in usefulness unequal to my zeal. If benefits have resulted 
to our country from these services, let it always be remembered to your praise, 
and as an instructive example m our annals, that under circumstances in which 
the passions, agitated in every direction, were liable to mislead — amid ap- 
pearances sometimes dubious — vicissitudes of fortxme often discouraging — in 
situations in which not unfrequently want @f success has countenanced the 
spirit of criticism — the constancy of your support was the essential prop of the 
efforts and the guaranty of the plans by which they were effected. 

Profoundly penetrated with this idea, I shall carry it with me to my grave, 
as a strong incitement to unceasing vows that Heaven may continue to you the 
choicest tokens of its benevolence ; that your union and brotherly affection may 
be perpetual ; that the free constitution, which is the work of your hands, may 
be sacredly maintained ; that its administration in every department may be 
stamped with wisdom and virtue ; that, in fine, the happiness of the people 01 
these states, under the auspices of liberty, may be made complete, by so careful 
a preservation and so prudent a use of this blessing as will acquire to them the 
glory of recommending it to the applause, the affection, and the adoption, of 
every nation which is yet a stranger to it. 

Here, perhaps, I ought to stop. But a solicitude for your welfare, which 
ean not end but with my life, and the apprehension of danger natural to that 
solicitude, urge me, on an occasion like the present, to offer to your solemn 
contemplation, and to recommend to your frequent review, some sentiments 
which are the result of much reflection, of no inconsiderable observation, and 
which appear to me all-important to the permanency of your felicity as a peo- 
ple. These will be ofiered to you with the more freedom, as you can only see 
in them the disinterested warnings of a parting friend, who can possibly have 
no personal motives to bias his counsel. Nor can I forget, as an encourage* 
ment to it, your indulgent reception of my sentiments on a former and not dis- 
similar occasion. Interwoven as is the love of liberty with every ligament of 
your hearts, no recommendation of mine is necessary to fortify or confirm the 
attachment. 

The unity of government which constitutes you one people is also now dear 
to you. It ;s justly so, for it is a main pillar in the edifice of your real inde- 
pendence, the support of your tranquillity at home, your peace abroad ; of your 
safety ; of your prosperity ; of that very liberty which you so highly prize. But 
as it is easy to foresee, that from different causes and from different quarters, 
much pains will be taken, many artifices employed, to weaken in your minds 
the conviction of this truth ; as this is the point in your political fortress against 



120 APPENDIX. 



which the batteries of internal and external enemies will be most constantly 
and actively (though often covertly and insidiously) directed, it is of infinite 
moment that you should properly estimate the immense value of your national 
Union to your collective and individual happiness ; that you should cherish a 
cordial, habitual, and immoveable attachment to it : accustoming yourselves 
to think and speak of it as of the palladium of your political safety and pros- 
perity ; watching for its preservation with jealous anxiety ; discountenancing 
whatever may suggest even a suspicion that it can in any event be abandoned ; 
and indignantly frowning upon the first dawning of every attempt to alienate 
any portion of our country from the rest, or to enfeeble the sacred ties which 
now link together the various parts. 

For this you have every inducement of sympathy and interest. Citizens by 
birth or choice of a common country, that country has a right to concentrate 
your aflfections. The name of America, which belongs to you in your national 
capacity, must always exalt the just pride of patriotism more than any appella- 
tion derived from local discriminations. With slight shades of difference, you 
have the same religion, manners, habits, and political principles. You have 
in a common cause fought and triumphed together ; the independence and lib- 
erty you possess are the work of joint counsels and joint efibrts — of common 
dangers, sufferings, and successes. But these considerations, however power- 
fully they address themselves to your sensibility, are greatly outweighed by 
those which apply more immediately to your interest : here every portion of 
our country finds the most commanding motives for carefully guarding and pre- 
serving the imion of the whole. 

The north, in an unrestrained intercourse with the south, protected by the 
equal laws of a common government, finds in the productions of the latter great 
additional resources of maritime and commercial enterprise, and precious ma- 
terials of manufacturing industry. The south, in the same intercourse, bene- 
fiting by the agency of the north, sees its agriculture grow and its commerce 
expand. Turning partly into its own channels the seamen of the north, it finds 
its particular navigation invigorated ; and while it contributes in different ways 
to nourishJand increase the general mass of the national navigation, it looks 
forward to the protection of a maritime strength to which itself is unequally 
adapted. The east, in a like intercourse with the west, already fuids, and in 
the progressive improvement of interior communications by land and water 
will more and more fijid, a valuable vent for the commodities which it brings 
from abroad or manufactures at home. The west derives from the east supplies 
requisite to its growth and comfort, and, what is perhaps of still greater conse- 
quence, it must of necessity owe the secure enjoyment of indispensable outlets 
for its own productions to the weight, influence, and the future maritime 
strength, of the Atlantic side of the Union, directed by an indissoluble commu- 
nity of interest as one nation. Any other tenure by which the west can hold 
this essential advantage, whether derived from its own separate strengtn, or 
from an apostate and unnatural connexion with any foreign power, must be in- 
trinsically precarious. 

While, then, every part of our country thus feels an immediate and particu- 
lar interest in union, all the parties combined can not fail to find in the united 
mass of means and efforts greater strength, greater resource, proportionably 
greater security from external danger, a less frequent interruption of their peace 



WASHINGTON'S FAREWELL ADDRESS. 



121 



by foreign nations, and, what is of inestimable value, they must derive from 
union an exemption from those broils and wars between themselves which so 
frequently afflict neighboring countries not tied together by the same govern- 
ment, which their own rivalships alone would be sufficient to produce, but 
which opposite foreign alliances, attachments, and intrigues, would stimulate 
and embitter. Hence, likewise, they will avoid the necessity of those over- 
grown military establishments which, under any form of government, are in- 
auspicious to liberty, and which are to be regarded as particularly hostile to 
republican liberty : in this sense it is that your union ought to be considered as 
a main prop of your liberty, and that the love of the one ought to endear to you 
the preservation of the other. 

These considerations speak a persuasive language to every reflecting and vir- 
tuous mind, and exhibit the continuance of the Union as a primary object of 
patriotic desire. Is there a doubt whether a common government can embrace 
so large a sphere ? Let experience solve it. To listen to mere speculation in 
such a case were criminal. We are authorized to hope that a proper organi- 
zation of the whole, with the auxiliary agency of government for the respec- 
tive subdivisions, will afford a happy issue to the experiment. 'Tis well worth 
a fair and full experiment. With such powerful and obvious motives to imion, 
affecting all parts of our country, while experience shall not have demonstrated 
its impracticability, there will always be leason to distrust the patriotism of 
those who in any quarter may endeavor to weaken its bands. 

In contemplating the causes which may disturb our vmion, it occurs as a mat- 
ter of serious concern that any ground should have been furnished for charac- 
terizing parties by geographical discriminations — northern and southern — 
Atlantic and western : Avhence designing men may endeavor to excite a belief 
that there is a real difference of local interests and views. One of the expedi- 
ents of party to acquire influence within particular districts is, to misrepresent 
the opinions and aims of other districts. You can not shield yoiu-selves too 
much against the jealousies and heartburnings which spring from these mis- 
representations : they tend to render alien to each other those who ought to be 
bound together by fraternal affection. The inhabitants of our western country 
have lately had a useful lesson on this head : they have seen in the negotiation 
by the executive, and in the xmanimous ratification by the senate, of the treaty 
with Spain, and in the universal satisfaction at that event throughout the Uni- 
ted States, a decisive proof how unfoimded were the suspicions propagated 
among them of a policy in the general government and in the Atlantic states 
unfriendly to their interests in regard to the Mississippi ; they have been wit- 
nesses to the formation of two treaties — that with Great Britain and that with 
Spain — which secure to them everything they could desire, in respect to our 
foreign relations, toward confirming their prosperity. Will it not be their wis- 
dom to rely for the preservation of these advantages on the Union by which 
they were procured ? Will they not henceforth be deaf to those advisers, if 
such there are, who would sever them from their brethren and connect them 
with aliens ? 

To the efficacy and permanency of your Union, a government for the whole 
is indispensable. No alliances, however strict, between the parts, can be an 
adequate substitute : they must inevitably experience the infractions and inter- 
ruptions which all alliances in all times have experienced. Sensible of this 



122 APPENDIX. 



momentous truth, you have improved upon your first essay by the adoption of 
a constitution of government better calculated than your former for an inti- 
mate union, and for the efficacious management of your common concerns. 
This government, the ofispring of our own choice, uninfluenced and unawed, 
adopted upon full investigation and mature deliberation, completely free in its 
principles, in the distribution of its powers, uniting security with energy, and 
containing within itself a provision for its own amendment, has a just claim 
to your confidence and your support. Respect for its authority, compliance 
with its laws, acquiescence in its measures, are duties enjoined by the funda- 
mental maxims of true liberty. The basis of our political systems is the right 
of the people to make and alter their constitutions of government ; but the con- 
stitution which at any time exists, till changed by an explicit and authentic 
act of the whole people, is sacredly obligatory upon all. The very idea of the 
power and the right of the people to establish government, presupposes the 
duty of every individual to obey the established government. 

All obstructions to the execution of the laws, all combinations and associa- 
tions, under whatever plausible character, with the real design to direct, con- 
trol, counteract, or awe, the regular deliberation and action of the constituted 
authorities, are destructive of this fundamental principle, and of fatal tendency. 
They serve to organize faction, to give it an artificial and extraordinary force — 
to put in the place of the delegated will of the nation, the will of a party, often 
a small but artful and enterprising minority of the community ; and, according 
to the alternate triumphs of difierent parties, to make the public administration 
the mirror of the ill-concerted and incongruous projects of faction rather than 
the organ of consistent and wholesome plans, digested by common councils and 
modified by mutual interests. However combinations or associations of the 
above description may now and then answer popular ends, they are likely in 
the course of time and things to become potent engines by which cunning, am- 
bitious, and imprincipled men will be enabled to subvert the power of the 
people, and to usurp to themselves the reins of government — destroying after- 
ward the very engines which have lifted them to tmjust dominion. 

Toward the preservation of your government, and the permanency of your 
present happy state, it is requisite, not only that you speedily discountenance 
irregular oppositions to its acknowledged authority, but also that you resist 
with care the spirit of innovation upon its principles, however specious the pre- 
texts. One method of assault may be to effect, in the forms of the constitution, 
alterations which impair the energy of the system, and thus to undermine what 
can not be directly overthrown. In all the changes to which you may be in- 
vited, remember that time and habit are at least as necessary to fix the true 
character of governments as of other human institutions ; that experience is the 
surest standard by which to test the real tendency of the existing constitution 
of a country; that facility in changes upon the credit of mere hypothesis and 
opinion, exposes to perpetual change from the endless variety of hypothesis and 
opinion ; and remember especially, that for the efficient management of your 
common interests in a country so extensive as ours, a government of as much 
vigor as is consistent with the perfect security of liberty, is indispensable. Lib- 
erty itself will find in such a government, with powers properly distributed and 
adjusted, its surest guardian. It is, indeed, little else than a name, where the 
government is too feeble to withstand the enterprises of faction, to confine each 



WASHINGTON'S FAREWELL ADDRESS. 323 

member of the society within the limits prescribed by the laws, and to maintain 
all in the secure and tranquil enjoyment of the rights of person and property. 

I have already intimated to you the danger of parties in the state, with par- 
ticular reference to the founding of them on geographical discriminations. Let 
me now take a more comprehensive view, and warn you in the most solemn 
manner against the baneful effects of the spirit of party generally. This spirit, 
unfortunately, is inseparable from our nature, having its root in the strongest 
passions of the human mind. It exists under different shapes in all govern- 
ments, more or less stifled, controlled, or repressed ; but in those of the popu- 
lar form it is seen in its greatest rankness, and is truly their worst enemy. 
The alternate domination of one faction over another, sharpened by the spirit 
of revenge natural to party dissension, which, in different ages and countries, 
has perpetrated the most horrid enormities, is itself frightful despotism. But 
this leads at length to a more formal and permanent despotism. The disorders 
and miseries which result, gradually incline the minds of men to seek security 
and repose in the absolute power of an individual ; and sooner or later the chief 
of some prevailing faction, more able or more fortunate than his competitor, 
turns this disposition to the purposes of his own elevation, on the ruins of pub- 
lic liberty. 

Without looking forward to an extremity of this kind (which nevertheless 
ought not to be entirely out of sight), the common and continual mischiefs 
of the spirit of party are sufficient to make it the interest and duty of a wise 
people to discourage and restrain it. It serves always to distract the public 
councils and enfeeble the public administration. It agitates the community 
with ill-founded jealousies and false alarms ; kindles the animosity of one part 
against another ; foments occasionally riot and insurrection. It opens the door 
to foreign influence and corruption, which find a facilitated access to the 
government itself through the channels of party passions. Thus the policy 
and the will of one country are subjected to the policy and will of another. 

There is an opinion that parties in free countries are useful checks upon the 
administration of the government, and serve to keep alive the spirit of liberty. 
This within certain limits is probably true ; and in governments of a monarchi- 
cal cast, patriotism may look with indulgence, if not with favor, upon the spirit 
of party. But in those of a popular character, in governments purely elective, 
it is a spirit not to be encouraged. From their natural tendency, it is certain 
there will always be enough of that spirit for every salutary purpose. And there 
being constant danger of excess, the effort ought to be by force of public opin- 
ion, to mitigate and assuage it. A fire not to be quenched, it demands a uni- 
form vigilance to prevent its bursting into a flame, lest, instead of warning, it 
should consume. 

It is important likewise that the habits of thinking in a free country should 
inspire caution in those intrusted with its administration, to confine themselves 
within their respective constitutional spheres, avoiding, in the exercise of the 
powers of one department, to encroach upon another. The spirit of encroach- 
ment tends to consolidate the powers of all the departments in one, and thus to 
create, whatever the form of government, a real despotism. A just estimate 
of that love of power, and proneness to abuse it, which predominates in the 
human heart, is sufficient to satisfy us of the truth of this position. The ne- 
cessity of reciprocal checks in the exercise of political power, by dividing and 



124 



APPENDIX. 



distributing it into difFerent depositaries, and constituting each the guardian of 
public weal against invasions by the others, has been evinced by experiments 
ancient and modern — some of them in our country and under our own eyes. 
To preserve them must be as necessary as to constitute them. If, in the opin- 
ion oi' the people, the distribution or modification of the constitutional powers 
he in any particular wrong, let it be corrected by an amendment in the way 
which the constitution designates. But let there be no change by usurpation ; 
■ for though this m one instance may be the instrument of good, it is the custom- 
ary weapon by which free governments are destroyed. The precedent must 
always greatly overbalance in permanent evil any partial or transient benefit 
which the use can at any time yield. 

Of all the dispositions and habits which lead to political prosperity, religion 
and morality are indispensable supports. In vain would that man claim the 
tribute of patriotism, Avho should labor to subvert these great pillars of human 
happiness, these firmest props of the duties of men and citizens. The mere 
politician, equally with the pious man, ought to respect and to cherish them 
A volume could not trace all their connexions Avith private and public felicity. 
Let it simply be asked, " Where is the security for property, for reputation, for 
life, if the sense of religious obligation desert the oaths, which are the instru- 
ments of investigation in courts of justice ?" — and let us with caution indulge 
the supposition that morality can be maintained without religion. Whatever 
may be conceded to the influence of refined education on minds of peculiar 
structure, reason and experience both forbid us to expect that national morality 
can prevail in exclusion of religious principle. 'Tis substantially true that vir- 
tue or morality is a necessary spring of popular government. The rule, in- 
deed, extends with more or less force to every species of free government. 
Who that is a sincere friend to it can look with indifference upon attempts to 
shake the foundation of the fabric ? 

Promote, then, as an object of primary importance, institutions for the gen- 
eral diffusion of knowledge. In proportion as the structure of a government 
gives force to public opinion, it is essential that public opinion should be en- 
lightened. As a very important source of strength and security, cherish public 
credit : one method of preserving it is to use it as sparingly as possible, avoid- 
ing occasions of expense by cultivating peace ; and remembering also that timely 
disbursements to prepare for danger, frequently prevent much greater disburse- 
ments to repel it ; avoiding likewise the accumulations of debt, not only by 
shunning occasions of expense, but by vigorous exertions in time of peace • to 
discharge the debts which unavoidable wars may have occasioned, not ungen- 
erously throwing upon posterity the burden which we ourselves ought to bear. 
The execution of these maxims belongs to your representatives, but it is neces- 
sary that public opinion should co-operate. To facilitate to them the perform- 
ance of tlieir duty, it is essential that you should practically bear in mind, that 
toward the payment of debts, there must be revenue : to have revenue, there 
must be taxes : that no taxes can be devised which are not more or less incon- 
venient and unpleasant ; and the intrinsic embarrassment inseparable from the 
selection of the proper object (which is always a choice of difficulties) ought to 
be a decisive motive for a candid construction of the conduct of the government 
in making it, and for a spirit of acquiescence in the measures for obtaining rev- 
enue which the public exigencies may at any time dictate. 



WASHINGTON'S FAREWELL ADDRESS. 

Observe good faith and justice toward all nations ; cultivate peace 
mony with all. Religion and morality enjoin this conduct, and can it he 
good policy does not equally enjoin it ? It will be worthy 'of a free, enlil 
ened, and at no distant period a great nation, to give to mankind the magnaL 
mous and too novel example of a people always guided by an exalted justice 
and benevolence. Who can doubt that in the course of time and thinsrs the 
fruits of such a plan would richly repay any temporary advantages which might 
be lost by a steady adherence to it ? Can it be that Providence has not con- 
nected the permanent felicity of a nation with its virtue? The experiment at 
least is recommended by every sentiment which ennobles human nature. Alas I 
is it rendered impossible by its vices ? 

In the execution of such a plan, nothing is more essential than that perma- 
nent, inveterate antipathies against particular nations, and passionate attach- 
ments for others, should be excluded ; and that in place of them just and ami- 
cable feelings toward all should be cultivated. The nation which indulges 
toward another an habitual hatred, or an habitual fondness, is in some degree 
a slave. It is a slave to its animosity or to its affection, either of which is 
sufficient to lead it astray from its duty and its interest. Antipathy in one na- 
tion against another disposes each more readily to offer insult and injury, to lay 
hold of slight causes of umbrage, and to be haughty and intractable when acci- 
dental or trifling occasions of dispute occur. Hence frequent collisions, obsti- 
nate, envenomed, and bloody contests. The nation prompted by ill-will and 
resentment sometimes impels to war the government, contrary to the best cal- 
culations of policy. The government sometimes participates in the national 
propensity, and adopts through passion what reason would reject ; at other 
times it makes the animosity of the nation subservient to projects of hostility 
instigated by pride, ambition, and other sinister and pernicious motives. The 
peace often, sometimes perhaps the liberty of nations, has been the victim. 

So likewise a passionate attachment of one nation for another produces a 
variety of evils. Sympathy for the favorite nation, facilitating the illusion of 
an imaginary common interest, in cases where no real common interest exists, 
and infusing into one the enmities of the other, betrays the former into a par- 
ticipation in the quarrels and wars of the latter, without adequate inducement 
or justification. It leads also to the concessions to the favorite nation of privi- 
leges denied to others, which is apt doubly to injure the nation making the con- 
cessions, by unnecessarily parting with what ought to have been retained, and 
by exciting jealousy, ill-will, and a disposition to retaliate, in the parties from 
whom equal privileges are withheld ; and it gives to ambitious, corrupted, or 
deluded citizens (who devote themselves to the favorite nation), facility to be- 
tray or sacrifice the interests of their own country without odium, sometimes 
even with popularity ; gilding with the appearances of a virtuous sense of obli- 
gation, a commendable deference for public opinion, or a laudable zeal for pub- 
lic good, the base or foolish compliances of ambition, corruption, or infatuation. 

As avenues to foreign influence in innumerable ways, such attachments are 
particularly alarming to the truly enlightened and independent patriot. How- 
many opportunities do they afford to tamper with domestic factions, to practise 
the arts of seduction, to mislead public opinions, to influence or awe public 
coxmcils ! Such an attachment of small or weak toward a great and powerful 
nation, dooms the former to be the satellites of the latter. Against the insidi- 



APPENDIX. 



♦ that 
It yr i' 
for (i!: 
ft','' V- 



duence (I conjure you to believe me, fellow-citizens), the jeal- 

e peo J ought to be constantly awake ; since history and experience 

./oii'i influence is one of the most baneful foes of republican government. 

i' ' y, to be useful, must be impartial, else it becomes the instrument of 

.nee to be avoided, instead of a defence against it. Excessive partiality 

.gn nation, and excessive dislike for another, cause those whom they actu-T^. 

danger only on one side, and serve to veil and even second the arts of in» 



f u on the other. Real patriots, who may resist the intrigues of the favorite, 

• uv able to become suspected and odious; while its tools and dupes usurp the ap« 
p' use and confidence of the people, to surrender their interests. The great rule of 
onduct for us in regard to foreign nations is, in extending our commercial relations, 
to have with them as little political connexion as possible. So far as we have already 
formed engagements, let them be fulfilled with perfect good faith. Here let us stop. 

Europe has a set of primary interests, which to us have none or a very remote 
relation. Hence she must be engaged in frequent controversies, the causes of which 
are essentially foreign to our concerns. Hence, therefore, it must be unwise in us 
to implicate ourselves, by artificial ties, in the ordinary vicissitudes of her politics, 
or the ordinary combinations and collisions of her friendships or enmities. Our de- 
tached and distant situation invites and enables us to pursue a difl'erent course. 
If we remain one people, under an eflJcient government, the period is not far oflf when 
we may defy material injury from external annoyance ; when we may take such an 
attitude as will cause the neutrality we may at any time resolve upon to be scrupu- 
lously if|espected ; when belligerent nations, under the impossibility of making acqui- 
sitions upon us, will not lightly hazard the giving us provocation ; when we may 
choose peace or war, as our interest, guided by justice, shall counsel. 

Why forego the advantages of so peculiar a situation ? Why quit our own to 
stand upon foreign ground ? Why, by interweaving our destiny with that of any pan 
of Europe, entangle our peace and prosperity in the toils of European ambition, ri- 
valship, interest, humor, or caprice ? It is our true policy to steer clear of permanent 
alliances with any portion of the foreign world — so far, I mean, as we are now at liberty 
to do it ; for let me not be understood as capable of patronizing infidelity to existing en- 
gagements. I hold the maxim no less applicable to public than to private affairs, that 
honesty is always the best policy. I repeat it, therefore, let those engagement* be 
observed in their genuine sense. But, in my opinion, it is unnecessary and would 
be unwise to extend them. Taking care always to keep ourselves, by suitable estab- 
lishments, on a respectable defensive posture, we may safely trust to temporary alli- 
ances for extraordinary emergencies. 

Harmony, and a liberal Intercourse with all nations, are recommended by policy, hu- 
manity, and interest. But even our commercial policy should hold an equal and im- 
partial hand : neither seeking nor granting exclusive favors or preferences ; consulting 
the natural course of things ; diffusing and diversifying by gentle means the streams 
of commerce, but forcing nothing ; establishing with powers so disposed — in order 
to give trade a stable course, to define the rights of our merchants, and to enable the 
government to support them — conventional rules of intercourse, the best that present 
circumstances and mutual opinions will permit, but temporary, and liable to be from 
time to time abandoned or varied, as experience and circumstances shall dictate ; 
constantly keeping in view that it is folly in one nation to look for disinterested favors 
from another ; that it must pay with a portion of its independence for whatever it 
may accept under that character ; that, by such acceptance, it may place itself in the 
condition of having given equivalents for nominal favors, and yet of being reproached 
with ingratitude for not giving more. There can be no greater error than to expect 



r 



WASniMGTON'S FiP.EWET.L ADDRESS. 



• ->»l/!ula»e-.-^f it is an iUuston ". JK xf^i, 

ence must cure — which a just pride ought to discard. '^'I'l 

In offerinar to you, my countrymen, these counsels of an old and affectionate friea^ 
I dare not hope they will make the strong and lasting impression I couU iv'sk; th^ 
they willcontrol the usual current of the passions, or prevent our natii i iVooi mn, 
ning the' course which has hitherto marked the destiny of nations : but i i; rven'. 
flatter myself that they may be productive of some partial benefit, son occasional 
good; that they may now and then recur, to moderate the fury of party s :mi,to warn 
against the mischiefs of foreign intrigues, and guard against the impo! . ires of pre- 
tended patriotism — this hope will be a full recompense for the solicit • for your 
welfare by which they have been dictated. How far, in the discharge y ofBcial 

duties, I have been guided by the principles which have been delineatr ,• public 

records and other evidences of my conduct must witness to you and to tl ild. To 
myself, the assurance of my own conscience is, that I have at least bel . ' myself 
to be guided by them. 

In relation to the still-subsisting war in Europe, my proclamation o ! 22d of 
April, 1793, is the index to my plan. Sanctioned by your approving ■ and by 

that of your representatives in both houses of Congress, the spirit of : measure 
has continually governed me, uninfluenced by any attempts to deter or d t me from 
it. After deliberate examination, with the aid of the best lights I could aia, i was 
well satisfied that our country, under all the circumstances of the cas ' ^d a right 
to take, and was bound in duty and interest to take, a neutral position. Hu /ing ta- 
ken it, I determined, as far as should depend upon me, to mahitain it wi( ui Jeratioaj 
perseverance, and firmness. 

The considerations which respect the right to hold this conduct, it is i t icceasary 
on this occasion to detail. I will only observe that, according to my 1 . . tanding 
of the matter, that right, so far from being denied by any of the bellig - powers, 
has been virtually admitted by all. The duty of holding a neutral coil -rmy be 

inferred, without anything more, from the obligation which justice and ity iia> 

pose upon every nation, in cases in which it is free t# act, to maintain 's tbr 

relations of peace and amity toward other nations. The inducements < it fol 

observing that conduct will be best referred to your own reflection ar ■. • Apiirienc^. 
With me, a predominant motive has been to endeavor to gain time to Ci~ , - wry (> 
settle and mature its yet-recent institutions, and to progress without inter) 
degree of strength and consistency which is necessary to give it, huma 
the command of its own fortunes. 

Though, in reviewing the incidents of my administration, I am unco 
tentional error, I am nevertheless too sensible of my defects not to thi 
that I may have committed many errors. Whatever they may be, I feri 2c;i 

the Almighty to avert or mitigate the evils to which they may tend. ■ ;lso 

ry with me the hope that my country will never cease to view the 
gc.ice; and that, after forty-five years of my life dedicated to its servic . 
\t zeal, the faults of incompetent abilities will be consigned to oblivion 
st soon be to the mansions of rest. Relying on its kindness in thi 
igs, and actuated by that fervent love toward it which is so natural m . 
- ws in ix the native soil of himself and his progenitors for several ; 
icipate with pleasing expectation that retreat in which I promise my 
hout alloy the sweet enjoyment of partaking, in the midst of my ft 
benign influence of good laws under a free government — the eve 
of mv bonrt nnrl thp hnnnv reward, as I trust, of our mutual car< 

GEORGE WASi 



